The Canadian national team has formally announced its 12-man roster for the Paris Olympics, making its final cuts ahead of Wednesday’s exhibition games against Team USA.
Team Canada’s 12-man squad is as follows:
- Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, G (Thunder)
- Jamal Murray, G (Nuggets)
- Nickeil Alexander-Walker, G (Timberwolves)
- Andrew Nembhard, G (Pacers)
- RJ Barrett, G/F (Raptors)
- Luguentz Dort, G/F (Thunder)
- Dillon Brooks, F (Rockets)
- Melvin Ejim, F (Unicaja)
- Trey Lyles, F (Kings)
- Kelly Olynyk, F/C (Raptors)
- Dwight Powell, F/C (Mavericks)
- Khem Birch, C (Girona)
While the group obviously isn’t as star-studded as the U.S. roster, it’s headed up by a 2024 MVP finalist (Gilgeous-Alexander) and a guard who was the second-best player on the 2023 NBA champions (Murray). In total, it features 10 active NBA players, and all of them played regular roles for their respective teams in 2023/24.
The only two non-NBA players are Birch, who spent six seasons in the league but now plays in Spain, and Ejim, a former Iowa State standout and a Team Canada veteran who has been a productive contributor for several teams in Europe since 2014.
Andrew Wiggins is among the notable names missing from Team Canada’s squad for Paris. He was on the original training camp roster but withdrew right before camp began due to what the Warriors referred to a mutual decision. Various reports, however, suggested that Golden State was the party driving that decision.
Grizzlies rookie Zach Edey also removed his name from the training camp roster in order to focus on Summer League and his first NBA season.
Trail Blazers guard Shaedon Sharpe and Pacers guard Bennedict Mathurin, both of whom were coming off injuries that ended their 2023/24 seasons, were among the players who attended training camp but weren’t in the mix for roster spots for the Paris Olympics. Timberwolves forward Leonard Miller was in that group too.
This will be the first time Canada has been in the men’s basketball event at the Olympics since 2000.
Not medaling would be disappointing with this roster.
Disappointment has been a staple of the Canadian basketball program for the entire 21st century
sankara , if the standard is USA basketball, then Canadian basketball will always be disappointing. But not by any other reasonable standard, especially Canada’s.
There are increasingly more and better Canadian players in the NBA, and results in international play are also steadily improving. Canada beat the USA squad, head-to-head, for the Bronze medal last summer.
Canada has the most players in the NBA of any country other than the US. It has 1/0 the population of the US, as well as less than 1/2 of the Western European countries that it’s surpassed over the last 20 years. That’s the opposite of “disappointing” to Canadians.
If youve followed FIBA basketball over the past 20+yrs then you know well how disappointing Canada has been in every men’s senior tournament they’ve been in. They’ve missed the past 5 Olympics even while having more NBA level talent than any other country in the world besides USA. They’ve endured numerous excruciating losses to less talented teams in that time. They did win bronze in the World Cup last summer but they were clearly talented enough to win gold. Even their best performance in a senior tournament ever was slightly disappointing. And ofc they never even came close to medaling at a WC before last yr. This is while producing numerous NBA lottery picks over the past 15yrs. Argentina & specifically Luis Scola beat Canada in a bunch of huge games over this time. This is a link to the loss that kept them out of the last Olympics. An extremely tough loss for Canada, specifically Andrew Wiggins… link to m.youtube.com
Wiggins & Canada losing to Venezuela in 2015. They missed the Rio Olympics bc of this loss. 9 NBA guys & 3 EuroLeague guys on their roster & they got embarrassed by a frankly tougher team… link to m.youtube.com
Jonas Valanciunas helping Lithuania blow out Canada at the World Cup just a few months after he was traded away from the Raptors. This loss sent Canada to 0-2 in group play & pretty much ended any chance of success at the tournament… link to m.youtube.com
I’m Canadian, so I do follow Canada closely, and am familiar with the facts you mention.
“Disappointment” is based on how actual achievement matches expectations, and expectations are based on ability.
20 years ago, Canada had way less talent than they do now. Relative to the rest of the world Canada ranked in the 8-15 range. The Canadian national squad, unlike today, had few NBA players, and no stars. Since then, Canada has had an extraordinary acceleration in the number and quality of its NBA players
Canadians were not “disappointed” by most of the losses you mention because they reflected the ability of the team. This Olympics, Canadians would be disappointed by anything less than a Bronze medal. That was never the case before.
They did have some solid teams from 2010 onward though and those teams did disappoint – to some degree. Should’ve qualified in 2012 & 2016. Plus the disappointments in the FIBA tournaments/qualifiers.
I mean not really, thats a really good team but lack size/rebounding, that really hurts against teams with great bigs like USA, Serbia and France. I think the top 3 are those 3 teams, if someone else wins a medal I would be surprised.
Bravo , FWIW, Vegas odds.
USA
-400
Canada
+900
Serbia
+1100
France
+1400
Greece
+1800
Germany
+2200
Australia
+4000
Spain
+8000
Brazil
+15000
Puerto Rico
+50000
Japan
+50000
South Sudan
+50000
Proves the Warriors are trying to trade Wiggins and dont want him to get hurt in a non-NBA game…
This is a very impressive looking squad for Canada. They have some savages, especially on the defensive side…(Shai, Dort, Brooks, Nembhard).
The bigs (Olynyk, Powell, Birch) are possibly the only weakness I see on this squad.
They have a logjam of guards and wings but the froncourt is pretty bad. Like Shai/Murray/Barret/Brooks?/Olynyk But I dont really like brooks at the 4 since he’s only 6’6 but playing Trey lies or playing an olynyk/Powell frouncourt is iffy
We’ll struggle against the big teams for sure.
That’s a nice roster. Could use bigs.
Very hype to see these guys in action tonight. The main/only way this Canada squad is gonna meet their expectations in this tournament is for DBrooks to go full Artest in Paris. He obv gotta be a menace defensively but he also has to be an overall bully & be efficient offensively (esp as a 3pt shooter). Basically just like he was at the World Cup last summer… link to m.youtube.com
Yup they really needed wiggins size and d
Why not Joseph???
After all the time he put in with the National team over the years he should have at least gotten an invite to try out, but they are stacked at guard…probably wouldn’t have made the team.
I agree, highly doubt he would make the cut to be on this team any more…but should’ve had an invite extended as a gesture of respect
Time to move on
This team is really going to miss Edey
Definitely could use him. It’s good to see how serious he is about NBA though.
They definitely need better centers….too bad Edey wasn’t a rookie last year, otherwise he would’ve seriously considered playing this year.
They have a very good team, though the lack of Wiggins, Sharpe and Mathurin Is considerable, and lowers their ceiling.
Brooks at the 4 won’t cut it. He should play SF. The only reason to have him at PF Is the lack of quality bigs.
With the missing pieces, Is an excellent team, top 3-4.
Still can put together a Fight for the Olympic final.
Besides MVP caliber Shai, and Barrett is a top player, who will be hard to stop.
Mathurin would be a game changer if he was healthy.