Paris Olympics: Kevin Durant passes Lisa Leslie as all-time leading American Olympic scorer

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Kevin Durant entered the Paris Olympics with a strong reputation as the best player in American basketball history.

It’s only gotten stronger. With a dunk in the third quarter of the U.S.’s 122-87 victory over Brazil in the Olympic quarterfinals on Tuesday, Durant became Team USA’s all-time leading scorer.

Durant entered Tuesday’s game five points behind the previous record of 488 points held by American great Lisa Leslie. He started slowly with two points in the first half, while Joel Embiid and Devin Booker set the pace of the American scoring.

But he scored a bucket off the bench early in the third period, then dunked from the baseline off a pass from Anthony Davis to give the U.S. an 86-59 lead.

The bucket gave Durant a career-high 489 points in his fourth Olympics. Leslie set the previous record in four Olympics that ended with four gold medals. Leslie’s record had stood since the U.S. women won gold in Beijing in 2008.

Four games and 16 years later, the mark now belongs to Durant with likely two games remaining in his USA Basketball career. He finished Tuesday’s game with 11 points, bringing his Olympic scoring total to 494.

Leslie congratulated Durant on her achievement on social media:

Where Durant Stands Among Other American Men’s Greats

Carmelo Anthony is the second-leading American male scorer with 336 points in the Olympics. LeBron James reached 328 points on Tuesday and is on pace to pass Anthony into second place. James is also poised to move into first place on the all-time Olympic steals list and second place in assists this Games as he makes his own case for all-time Olympic greatness.

But there’s no doubt that Durant is historically Team USA’s most lethal offensive weapon. And he doesn’t have the bronze medal on his resume that James and Anthony carry from the disappointing 2004 Games in Athens.

Team USA will face Nikola Jokić and Serbia in the semifinals on Thursday. Win or lose, the U.S. will advance to the medal match. A win will send the U.S. to the gold medal match against the winner of the other semifinal between Germany and host France. A loss will send the U.S. to the bronze medal match.

Four straight gold medals for Durant?

Anything less than gold would, of course, be a huge disappointment for a U.S. men’s team seeking its fifth consecutive gold medal. Durant has starred on the last three gold-medal teams while building a career as arguably the best U.S. basketball player ever at the Olympics.

Durant emerged as Team USA’s best weapon during his first Olympic Games in London in 2012, averaging 19.5 points, 5.8 rebounds, 2.6 assists and 1.6 steals while shooting 48.5 percent and 52.3 percent from three. That was on a team that also featured James, Kobe Bryant, Anthony and James Harden.

Since then, he has accepted every invitation from USA Basketball to play in the Olympics and has been the program’s most consistent weapon during the Olympics. For Team USA, he averaged 19.7 points per game, helping him to two more gold medals in Rio de Janeiro and Tokyo.

He entered the Paris Games with a calf injury that limited his ability to practice and warm up for the Games. Since then, he has come off the bench as an extravagant luxury for Team USA. He averaged 16 points per game in the group stage and shot 63 percent from the field, trailing only Anthony Edwards’ team-leading 16.7 points per game.

Now he is just two wins away from his fourth Olympic gold medal.