Golden State Warriors forward Andre Iguodala has had a long and productive career. He has he won three NBA championships and two gold medals with Team USA, as well as several personal awards. In an interview with Ric Bucher of Bleacher Report, Iguodala compared playing with Team USA to playing with the Warriors, emphasizing the expectation to win and the closeness of the team:

“We make the Finals four years ago, and it was, ‘Man, I just love y'all so much for what you've done and how y'all play. Win or lose, love y'all.' Now? Guy pulls up next to me and says, ‘Hey, I need another one! I need y'all to get another one!' My bad. Three ain't enough. I'll get you another one. Playing for the Warriors is just like playing for Team USA. When you play in the Olympics, you don't even enjoy it. There's the anxiety of ‘We have to win. We can't lose, or we can't go back home.' We talk about it on the Olympic team: ‘We can't go back home without the gold medal, fellas. Got to lock in. Let's lock in.' Then once you win, it's like, ‘Yeah, we got it, we can go back home. Yay, we won, but we were supposed to.'”

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The Warriors have been the favorite in all of their Finals appearances, just as Team USA is the favorite to win every game they play. Iguodala stresses that this can take a bit of the joy out of winning since the team is supposed to win.

Iguodala can add on to his lengthy list of accolades with another championship this year. While it might not bring as much joy as the first one, the talented forward will certainly leave it all on the court in the quest for a fourth ring.