Shaq isn’t upset he was left off the 1992 Dream Team

Shaquille O’Neal puts to rest any thoughts that you should have been on The Dream Team over Christian Laettner.

Isiah Thomas is still bitter he was not selected to play on the 1992 Olympic Dream Team.

Shaquille O’Neal, who was also left of the legendary team, is not.

“Christian Laettner was better than me in college,” O’Neal told Da Windy City Podcast. “He really was so I’m not going to cry about that. Fundamentally he was better. He had a bigger impact at Duke than I had at LSU.”

The Dream Team famously selected one college player to join the legendary likes of Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, and Larry Bird in Barcelona back in 1992. Shaq had yet to embark on his Hall of Fame career but even back then it was a bit puzzling that the country’s best college player wasn’t going to be introduced to the world on such a stage.

Imagine if our first real introduction to Shaq and everything he’d become was with the Dream Team.

It is true, however, that Laettner did a lot more winning at Duke than O’Neal did at LSU. Laettner’s Duke teams won back-to-back championships and were in the NCAA Finals three years in a row. Laettner also played in the Final Four every year of his stellar college career and hit one of the most clutch shots in college basketball history.

Laettner also benefited playing with Danny Ferry, Bobby Hurley, and Grant Hill. Hill was on the two championship teams along with Hurley.

O’Neal was not playing with stars. His best LSU team was his freshman year when he played with Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf and Stanley Roberts. LSU lost in the second round to Georgia Tech led by future Shaq teammate Dennis Scott along with Kenny Anderson. The Yellow Jackets advanced to the Final Four.

Sophomore year O’Neal’s LSU team lost in the first round to Connecticut, who then lost to eventual champion Duke in the Sweet 16. Shaq did all he could with 27 points and 16 rebounds. That season was Laettner’s first NCAA championship.

O’Neals junior and final year at LSU ended with a loss to Indiana in the second round of the NCAA tournament. O’Neal finished with a monster final game- 36 points and 12 rebounds. The Hoosiers advanced to the Final Four but lost to Duke and Laettner. Duke then beat Michigan’s Fab Five to complete back-to-back championship seasons.

“I’m just going to go on the record and say that,” O’Neal said. “He earned it fair and square, I’m not going to say I should have been cause Duke was winning championships, I was getting knocked it out in the first or second round, therefore he was a better player than I was.”

Eh, not really. But props to Shaq for being the bigger man and giving credit to Laettner. The Dream Team was going to win the gold medal with either choice.

O’Neal won the NBA Rookie of the Year in 1993, instantly dominant with 23 ppg and 14 rpg. The Magic had 20 more wins than the previous season although they missed the playoffs finishing 41-41. Four NBA championships and three Finals MVP’s later, O’Neal was enshrined in the basketball Hall of Fame.

Laettner had a solid if not spectacular 13-year NBA career that gets underrated. He scored over 11,000 points.