Paris 2024 Olympics: Victor Wembanyama & Yuki Kawamura Basketball Game Highlights

I'm gonna be honest with you guys, I uploaded this video at 2am, it got 27,000 views in 4 hours until the Olympics took it down

I debated not even re-uploading this video, but the breakdown of the game is the same, you'll just have to watch the highlights yourself later

It feels like clear-cut fair use to me, but it's not worth fighting, it's the Olympics, they take everything down, I should have been prepared

So with that being said, let's get into the video. I'm going to be honest with you guys right off the bat here

I made this video assuming that Victor Wembin Yama was going to go off

And that's what this video was supposed to be about. Although Wembi did have a good game, it was a 5'8 point guard from Japan

That was the one that stole the show. This game had everything you could want in it

An ejection, an impossible play to force overtime. And like I said, an insane performance from this little Japanese point guard that you have probably never heard of

meet yuki kawamura or as they actually say in japan the surname goes first so kawamura yuki a

23 year old 5'8 point guard that plays in the japanese b1 league for the yokohama b corsairs

last year in that league he averaged 20.9 points per game and eight assists and this has been his

dream back in march of 2022 when he decided to drop out of university pursuing a professional

career in basketball he was quoted saying my goal is to become a point guard representing japan

and to compete in the paris olympics well here you are yuki he had a really good fibo world cup

last year japan would not make it out of their group going one and two but he averaged 13.6

points per game and 7.6 assists and coming into this game japan is the 26th ranked team in the

world with the point spread of this game being minus 17 and a half japan lost their first game

to germany 97 to 77 if one player who plays significant minutes in the nba and that is the

los angeles laker himself rui hachimura yuda watsunabe played for the memphis grizzlies this

past year in his fifth nba season but let's get right into the recap of this game team france

is want to know they beat brazil 78 to 66 of course victor webin yama is the superstar for

team france but they also have the reigning defensive player of the year in the nba rudy

Gobert. One last thing before we get started, what Yuki Kawamura does in this game is something

only two other Olympians have ever done since 2000. That was Kevin Durant 2016 and Luel Dang

in 2012. Let's get right into it. Rui hits a jumper to start for Japan. He was great in this

game. We will talk a lot about him, but unfortunately something happens with him later on in this game

that changes the course of the game for Team Japan. Yuki gets it going early as well with this layup

japan is up four to zero before wemby hits this three ruy's feeling it early he hits another shot

here he went just four for 19 in that first game for team japan victor's also feeling good to start

this game he hits this jumper here and then a deep three giving him eight quick points with a

three for three starts and team france is up 12 to seven yuki kawamura has back to back three

pointers tying the game at 16 he's absolutely electric he's so quick and again here 10 points

in this first half. Remember, he's just 5'8 out there. This first quarter, especially, he was balling

He has this great assist here, or what should have been an assist, but his teammate cannot handle the pass

This time, he will record an assist when Josh Hawkinson hits this three-pointer

And I was curious about Josh Hawkinson because he played great for Team Japan in the World Cup

He was their leading scorer at like 23 points per game. How does this guy have Japanese citizenship Well he played college basketball for Washington State From 2013 to 2017 his senior year he averaged 15 and 10 boards He would not get drafted in the NBA draft and went over playing professionally in Japan

for the past seven years. Just this last year, he became a naturalized citizen

A really cool story for a kid out of Shoreline, Washington. France hits a three to end the quarter, 32 to 25

And in this first quarter, both teams shot it very well. Like I said, Wemby already has eight points on three for three from the field

Yuki has 10 and Rui has eight as well. None of these players play to begin the second quarter

But with around six and a half minutes left in the quarter, Wemby, Yuki, and Rui are all back in the game

And France is up 36 to 31. Rui hits another three, making it 38-34

and then Josh Hawkinson hits a three as well, 42-37. And then Team Japan hits another three

this time from backup point guard, Yuki Tagashi. And if you're questioning if that name sounds familiar

you probably are. He actually made an appearance on the Dallas Mavericks 2014 Summer League team

which at the time was a really big deal. He would be the Japanese B1 League's MVP in 2019

and he had this viral picture in this game when he was guarding Victor Webinyama going crazy on X

Rui continues his impressive half with his turnaround jumper and Japan is up 42-40. Rui

already has 14 points. It baffles me with how bad of guard play France has, how little Wemby will

get the ball on the court. He's 4-4-4 at this point in the game with 10 points and there's plenty

of possessions where he just doesn't even get a touch. France is up 49-44 at halftime. In the

second half, France's coach decides to go without Rudy Gobert to start it. He will instead rotate

minutes between Wemby and Rudy and go smaller versus this Japan team. Josh Hawkinson hits a

three to tie the game at 49, and then a three from Yuki puts Japan up 52-51. Josh Hawkinson had a

great game as well he hits another three giving japan its greatest lead of the game at four here's

another example of anyone else on team france trying to guard rui hachimura it's just not going

to work yuki kawamura hits another three this one very deep and over wemby he actually stunned wemby

wemby didn't even go for the block japan is up 62 60 with 4 30 left at this point wemby is going

to take a rest. Rudy Gobert comes in for the first time in the second half, which is bad news for

France because they just lost Wemby's third quarter minutes by seven. But what's even more

important in this sequence is that Rui Hachimura gets his first unsportsmanlike foul on him for

this bump on Bilal Koulibaly. Make a mental note about that because we will reference it later

With Kawamura on the bench, Japan will finish the quarter not too strong and be down 69-64 heading

into the fourth Rui hits two threes immediately for Japan bringing them back within just two points

72 to 70 he now has 24 points on the night on 10 for 16 from the field unfortunately on the very

next possession this play yeah this play on Rudy Gobert by Rui Hachimura gets him ejected from the

game now before you go commenting I know this is FIBA rules an unsportsmanlike foul is different

than our flagrant ones and flagrant twos in the NBA. So by the rule book

an unsportsmanlike foul is a player contact which in the judgment of a referee that meets one of the following five criteria and just pause it and read these if you really want to know exactly what an sportsman like foul is but i not going

to read all of them this ruy foul does hit on criteria one contact with an opponent and not

legitimately attempting to directly play the ball within the spirit and intent of the rules so him

grabbing gobert's arm isn't a basketball play especially when he excessively holds his arm down

and swings it down. So I get it. The FIBA refs are doing their job, but this is an absolutely garbage rule

I hate it. And there's some things about FIBA that I do like. This is awful

A player should never be ejected for this. Grober was never in danger

And I think at the end of the day, if we're ejecting players, it needs to be due to player safety

or disrespect to an official, but nothing else. And so with that, Team Japan loses its best player

It's only NBA player that gets significant minutes in Rui Hachimura after a fantastic game

Like I said, 24 points, 10 for 16 from the field. And these two unsportsmanlike fouls

DQ him from the game, down just two with 8.31 to go in the fourth

Yuki pulls up from three again, drains it and gets fouled, completes the four point play

Japan is down just 77 to 76. Yuki now has 20 points on seven for 14

from the field and five threes. Hawkinson does a fantastic job of not letting Wemby bury him and Wemby misses this shot and

Kawamura just blows by his defender laying it in giving Japan a lead 78-77 Hawkinson then blocks

Wemby maybe it was a foul Rudy actually gets a piece of his step back three here determined to

not have a Luka Doncic type play be repeated on the national stage versus a 5-8 point guard but

then on the other end Rudy gets blocked at the rim as well. Wemby gets switched on to Kawamura and I

love how he isn't scared at 5'8". He drives with Wemby on him and dishes it to Hawkinson who finishes

over Wemby. Japan's up three with a minute to go. Fournier hits this clutch three for France with

49 seconds left but Kawamura gets fouled, hits both free throws. He now has 24 points and not

only does Fournier miss this three, but on the offensive rebound, Wemby misses a three as well

Yuki gets fouled again, making it 84 to 80 with 16 seconds left. Japan is going to win this one

but no, instead, Matthew Strazzel for France hits a three and they call a foul on Yuki in the

process. Look at this replay. How the heck is this a foul? How do you call this in a four point game

for the host team France. I'm sorry guys, but this is an absolute joke

The only place he makes any contact is on the hip of Strazzel, but it's marginal

You can tell he doesn't shove him. If you watch it in slow motion, Yuki is merely placing his hand on Strazzel's hip

He does not push him. I'm still in disbelief about this foul. It was garbage

Strazzel, to his credit, he makes a shot. He makes the free throw. The game is tied at 84

and yuki misses the step back three as time expires guys this would have been the perfect

storybook ending if yuki hit that three instead we go to overtime and if you think about it japan

has now gotten screwed once by the rule book which i just think is a terrible rule for fiba with rui

getting ejected their best player with eight minutes to go 24 points and then secondly on a

clear non-foul he did not get fouled i don't know how you call that yuki kawamura scored or assistant

on the last 12 plays for Japan in Rui's absence. He willed them to that game

They deserve to win. Instead in overtime Japan was completely exhausted This is usually what happens for underdogs if they end up going to overtime They run out of gas Wemby gets an and one and then he hits a three after Kawamura misses this three

over Wemby and Yuki just couldn't score in overtime he does hit this one three late in

overtime it was Japan's first score actually of overtime their offense was just non-existent

without Rui out there Yuki at 5'8 had to do everything and he was also running out of gas

and Japan loses this one 94 to 90. They did make a three to make it 92 to 90

and Strazzel would make both free throws. So this is pretty heartbreaking for me during this game

I didn't know who Yuki Kawamura was, but watching him play, I think he just cemented himself

as an icon on the Olympic level after today's game. We'll take a look at the box scores here in a minute

but I wanna say that Yuki did have this to say after the game. We lost the game

I have to get better. Kawamura had 29 points, six rebounds, and six assists

And yes, he didn't shoot it great from the field, but he was shooting about 50% from the field

before Rui went out. And down the stretch, he was literally their only offense

He had to take shots. Even a bad look for him was still probably Japan's

best look they were going to get. If we take a look at Japan's box score here

like I said, Rui Hachimura in 28 minutes, 24 points, 10 for 16 from the field

yuki kawamura 29 points 9 for 26 from the field 7 rebounds 6 assists and a plus minus of just

minus 1 and then josh hawkinson was actually awesome for japan as well he played 38 minutes

scored 16 points on 4 for 6 from 3 and 8 boards and that was pretty much team japan's offense

on team france's side as you can see here when we finished with 18 points he didn't shoot it great

After that 4-for-4 start, he went just 6-for-13 from the field, but he did have 11 boards and 6 assists as well

Rudy Gobert had 7 points and 15 boards. And then Matthew Strazzel, he's just 21 years old

He plays for Monaco in the EuroLeague. Had 17 points on 5-for-9 from the field, 4-for-7 from 3

But I'll be honest, guys, I'm not impressed with Team France at all. Their guard plays terrible

Bilal Koulibaly barely plays. I was hoping this could be a breakout tournament for him

And it's pretty much on Wemby. I wish they'd run the offense through him more

They just won't get in the ball at different times. We'll see if they can bounce back. They got silver at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics

And they were pretty good favorites to medal. As for Japan, they now move to 0-2

They're not going to make it to the knockout round, which is pretty sad. They needed that win

Not only do they have a bad plus minus point differential, but in order to make it out of your group, they're going to have to beat Brazil

and then hope that one of the best third place teams in these groups is just one and two

and has a worse point differential than them. If they win this game, they would have had a great shot to move on

but I have to give props to Yuki one more time. This dude's 5'8", a masterful performance

from the 23-year-old. And unfortunately, two different things just don't go their way with Rui getting ejected

and that awful four-point play at the end. Hope you guys enjoyed this video

if you did be on the lookout tomorrow for a team usa video they play south sudan in a rematch and at

the end of that video i will be recapping the other games that we have not covered since the

last video hope you guys enjoyed this one go look up some yuki kawamura highlights in the japan b1

league he's actually super electric and fun to watch thanks for watching remember to subscribe

turn notifications on if you're here at this point we have a discord you can join as well the link

Link is in the description. And as always, we'll see you on the hardwood