Year in Review: 5 key moments that changed the Cavs in 2021

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Darius Garland, Cleveland Cavaliers. (Photo by Jason Miller/Getty Images) /

5 key moments that changed the Cavs in 2021 – 2. Darius Garland training with Team USA

The 2020 Summer Olympics were pushed back to 2021, and this summer a hastily-cobbled-together roster of American stars went to Las Vegas in early July to train and prepare for Tokyo, where they would ultimately win a gold medal. To help them prepare, a small number of up-and-coming players were invited to join them.

This “Team USA Select Team” included one Darius Garland, fresh off his sophomore season and burgeoning with potential. Garland surprisingly got the nod over his teammate Collin Sexton, who was inside the Top-20 in scoring that year. USA basketball saw something in Garland to bring him in.

When COVID-19 hit the roster and members of the Select Team were called to play with the Olympians in their exhibition games, Garland was one of the three players who got the honor. His combination of shooting, passing and shot-making caught the eye of some of basketball’s brightest then, and it almost resulted in a trip to Tokyo and a gold medal; if the head coach hadn’t been Gregg Popovich and Pop hadn’t taken his “own guy” in Keldon Johnson, it could have been Garland on the podium in Tokyo.

Whatever Team USA saw in Garland, they were dead-on. He has done nothing but excel to start the season, putting up 19.5 points and 7.3 assists while shooting 39.4 percent from 3-point range on a robust 6.8 attempts. He has a strong case to be an All-Star, and like so many young players before him, being in and around the stars and coaches of Team USA seems to have had an impact on Garland. Could he be wearing the red, white and blue in 2024?