That one time Jamal Mashburn beat the Dream Team

Jamal Mashburn is a significant historical footnote in basketball history. The former Wildcat is one of only eight players that can say they beat the Dream Team and lived to tell the tale. The legend of that story has grown and now Mashburn is ready to share something you have not heard before.

For the first time in 1992, the USA Olympic basketball team was not filled with college kids. The new rule paved the way for the Dream Team’s creation, yet the college kids still needed some sort of international basketball outlet. They got that by becoming members of the Developmental Team. Their goal was simple — make the Dream Team better. They accomplished that goal, to a degree, all while hearing plenty of trash talk from basketball legends.

While sitting in with The Players’ Tribune podcast Knuckleheads, Mashburn went back to the summer of 1992 to share his first memory of that experience. Let’s just say Larry Bird wasn’t welcoming them with arm’s wide open.

“Get some f’***ing rest. It’s going to be a long week,” Bird told Mashburn and a few others.

The following day the Developmental Team put it on the Dream Team. The college group led 62-54 after 20 minutes. Chuck Daly promptly called the scrimmage off at the midway point and let in the media. Legend has it that Daly let the college kids win, something Mashburn pushes back on, “He just stopped the game early.”

The night after the victory, the college kids felt froggy, maybe too froggy. Rodney Rogers spotted Bird and Magic Johnson at the hotel and said, “Hey Larry, you ain’t hit a jumper since ’84.” The message was well received the following day.

“Magic Johnson fed Larry Bird the ball probably about eight times in row downcourt,” Mashburn recalled. “Larry Bird got the ball on Rodney Rogers and every time he was about to make a move, he told him what he was going to do. One dribble, pull up going left, off the glass. One dribble going right, spin, shot, bucket. He scored eight times in a row, left the court to go lay down and said, ‘Young fella, looks like 84, huh?'”

More like Larry Burn, amirite?

Lesson learned: Don't trash talk Larry Bird.

Hear @jamalmashburn tell the story of facing the Dream Team in college.

For the full episode of Knuckleheads with @QRich and @21Blackking: https://t.co/ZyWXxhSVbO

In partnership with @wingstop. pic.twitter.com/4tOV4Vjdd1

— The Players' Tribune (@PlayersTribune) June 29, 2021

Even though the games against the Developmental Team may have simply served as a motivational tool for the Dream Team, there’s no denying that it worked. Mashburn never got a gold medal, but he can always claim a win over the greatest basketball team ever assembled.