Olympic Legends - Shane Heal

ATLANTA (Olympics) - Shane Heal was a favorite for Australian basketball fans.

The point guard backed down from no one.

That included Team USA's Charles Barkley at the Atlanta Games.

It was the second Olympics for America's NBA players and Barkley was one of the most important in that side.

Barkley had played on the Dream Team four years before at the Barcelona Games that mesmerized the world with a gold-medal run.

In Spain, however, the United States never faced the Australians.

If they had, they would have known about gritty Heal.

The Boomers were not only good in Atlanta, which they proved by reaching the Semi-Finals.

They were as hard and unyielding as any team from Down Under to play at an Olympics.

The 183m Heal looked short compared to most of the USA players.

Yet height should never be confused with toughness and especially on a basketball court.

That was evident when the Melbourne native had an altercation with the 1.98m, 114kg Barkley on Day 2 of Preliminary Round action.

His fourth three-pointer led to the most talked about incident at the tournament.

While shooting and making that shot from the left corner in front of the Boomers bench in the second half, Heal maintained his concentration as Barkley ran at him with his head down before easing past.

Heal fell to the ground and then had words with Barkley as the American started to run up the court.

The two chest-bumped and were separated by the referee.

Heal and Barkley went after each other again, however, at midcourt.

Both Karl Malone of the USA and Andrew Gaze of Australia stepped in between the two before the combatants retreated.

The USA ended up winning decisively, 101-73, but what everyone talked about after was the tête-à-tête between Barkley and Heal, and the new-found understanding that Australians couldn’t be pushed around.

Heal ended up averaging 17.8 points and shooting 40.3% (31 of 77) from long range in Atlanta.

He also dished out 5.1 assists.

The ’96 Games were the last for Sir Charles, who won this second gold medal, but not for Heal.

He would go on to play in Sydney four years later and then again in Athens in 2004.

Since his retirement from the game as a player, Heal has often been asked about his confrontation with Barkley.

“I idolized him,” Heal said.

“He was awesome.

“He turned out to be a good bloke.

“They were pretty arrogant, though, and didn’t have a lot of respect for us.

“We were looking forward to playing against them but at the same time we said we weren’t going to take a backward step.

“The Dream Team disrespected us and tried to bully us a bit and we stood up for ourselves and it got a bit heated.

“It was a lot of fun.”

His showdown with Barkley is still one of the most talked about moments in Olympic history.

“I reckon someone would ask me about that every second day,” Heal said.

“It amazes me – it happened in 1996 – that people still want to know about it.”


FIBA