With six minutes left, the U.S. team, made up of future Hall of Famers, was trailing to … not Russia, not Spain, but Lithuania. Yes, the Lithuania whose estimated population of 3.2 million is about a quarter of the Los Angeles metropolitan area. The same Lithuanian team that lost to Nigeria a month ago, a team the U.S. beat by 83 points last week.

And then, like in a bad sports movie, LeBron came off the bench, took on their best player –  Linas Kleiza, who plays for the Toronto Raptors – and stayed on him much of the time. LeBron scored 9 of his 20 points, pulled down two rebounds, stole a ball, and said to Team USA, in the words of U.S. coach Mike Krzyzewski, “I got this. I’m doing this.”

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If you think the British are reserved, you did not hear the roar that greeted their own Jessica Ennis, the poster girl, literally, for British athletics in the 2012 London Olympics. The pressure Ennis was under Friday as she lined up for the first event of the heptathlon – which unofficially determines the world’s best female athlete -- must have made what Andy Murray went through at Wimbledon last month seems like a Frisbee toss in Hyde Park.

Before these games, you may not have known Jessica’s face, but you may have probably seen her washboard-toned midriff on billboards all over the city and even in a field on the landing pattern into Heathrow. NBC cameramen could not resist, zooming in Ms. Ennis’ midsection at least four times during the first day. Her latest honor is a perfect likeness in wax at  Madame Tussaud’s.

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