The Americans were in serious trouble until James – in his third Olympics – stepped up in the closing minutes.

“It was like LeBron said, ‘I got this, I’m doing this,” U.S. coach Mike Krzyzewski said.

James scored 9 his 20 points in the final four minutes for the U.S. (4-0), which had looked nearly invincible in thrashing Nigeria 156-73 on Thursday night while breaking several records. But the Americans were reminded that the path to a gold medal is loaded with traps and Lithuania nearly sprang one.

“You want to get tested,” James said. “The best teams want to be tested. We love the competition. We’ve got some of the greatest competitors in our league, in this world, so you want to have a game where you feel like you were tested, and we had that today.”

via The Associated Press