Veteran Of The 1972 Olympic Basketball Debacle Ranks The Other Olympic Scandals

Tom McMillen has done plenty. He had an 11-year NBA career. He was a Rhodes Scholar. He was a congressman. But, 46 years later, he’s still rankled by the absolute theft of the 1972 Olympic gold medal basketball game by the USSR, one of the biggest injustices in Olympic history.

McMillen was guarding the inbounds pass—the third one, after refs decided to reset the first two failed attempts—that led to the last-second Soviet win. He knows controversy. So we asked him to rank the great Winter Olympic scandals, among other things, in the process of which he revealed that he suggested to organizers that the ‘72 U.S. and USSR teams share gold medals—a proposal not even his teammates supported.

Senior Producer: Kiran ChitanvisShooter: Hannah WisenantEditor: Anders Kapur