Andrew Wiggins would love to represent his home country at the Olympics someday. But Wiggins isn't interested in making the commitment Team Canada now requires of their players.

Canada Basketball recently announced that they would have a core group of 14 players who represent the team during a three-year cycle. That sort of long-term commitment isn't one Wiggins had an interest in making.

“They wanted a long-term commitment. Right now, (my priority) is for the Golden State Warriors. I got kids. I got family. I got a life outside of basketball,” Wiggins explained. “So, to commit three years to the Warriors and to Canada Basketball, it wouldn't make sense to me… I spend the whole time in-season with the Warriors, and summertime I get to decide.”

Team Canada coach Nick Nurse said that players who don't commit to the three-year cycle will "have to hope there is a spot" for them when it's time to pick the Olympics squad. Wiggins hopes that could include him, but he's got no hard feelings if it doesn't.

“I would love to play if they made the Olympics,” Wiggins said. “But I won't do no three-year commitment, you know? If not — I wouldn't lose no sleep over it if they didn’t let me. If they didn't, that would be on them.”

Viewership for the NBA's Christmas Day slate was up 5% from last season, with the five games averaging a 1.8 rating with 4.31 million viewers.

The Bucks-Celtics matchup recorded the highest viewership in the day with 6.08 million viewers and a 2.25 rating. Viewership was up 17% from last year's equivalent game, with the Celtics win also representing the first time since 1995 that the most-watched Christmas Day did not feature Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, or LeBron James. 

Three out of the five games registered a double-digit increase in viewership. The Grizzlies-Warriors and Lakers-Mavs were both down in ratings from their equivalent time slots last season.

With an average of 1.9 and 4.07 million viewers, the Sixers-Knicks was the most-watched Noon ET Christmas Day game since 2011.

The Suns-Nuggets was also the most-watched late-night Christmas game since 2015. 

Andrew Wiggins has been cleared to return from an adductor strain after missing the previous 10 games with the injury.

Wiggins, who missed the Warriors' Tuesday night win over the Hornets, will miss Wednesday's game against the Jazz with an illness.

The Warriors then play the Blazers on Friday. 

The Golden State Warriors had targeted their Christmas Day matchup with the Memphis Grizzlies as the return game for Andrew Wiggins. However, Wiggins remains out with a strained adductor and missed his 10th consecutive game.

Before the game, Warriors coach Steve Kerr said that Wiggins injury has "lingered longer than we expected". Kerr reiterated that the team hopes Wiggins will return soon, but that there is no firm timeline. He also said Wiggins has to do live on-court work before returning to the lineup.

Golden State has gone 3-7 without Wiggins in the lineup, which has overlapped with star guard Stephen Curry also missing games. Wiggins has averaged 19.1 points on 51% shooting from the floor, including 45% from behind the arc.

Stephen Curry has missed the last four games for the Golden State Warriors. However, the Warriors shared some good news on Saturday.

Curry suffered a subluxation of his left shoulder in a game against the Indiana Pacers on December 14. A recent re-evaluation showed that Curry is making good progress in his return from that injury. Curry will be re-evaluated again in two weeks.

The Warriors have gone 1-3 since Curry got injured. The defending champions are 1-6 in the seven games Curry has missed this season. Overall, Golden State sits at 15-18 and are in 11th place in the Western Conference.

The Golden State Warriors sit outside of Play-In picture, as they are currently 11th in the Western Conference. They're coming off a 1-5 road trip, where they were blown out several times. The losing has the defending champions in a rough spot mentally according to one of their leaders.

"Right now, I think we are very fragile," Draymond Green said Friday after practice. "You start going through these things and then you start believing them. Once you start believing them, it becomes who you are. The only way to break them is by being mentally tough."

Green remains confident in his team, but says they have to work to turn things around.

"It's not something that's going to be fixed with the snap of a finger," Green said. "You've got to work through these issues to get that confidence. It's just not showing up. As much as you'd like to think, 'Oh, we'll be fine, and this guy will come back.' No, no, no. You've got to work (for) positive outcomes, positive feelings, that ultimately give you that boost of confidence."

Kevin Durant played the Golden State Warriors this week for the first time since his former team won a title without him.

“I can’t lie: Watching the Finals, I knew so many people would turn their focus on me once they won. I was like, I hate that they won, because y’all not going to make it about them; it’s going to be all about me,” Durant told Michael Lee of the Washington Post. “I think it’s just a childish way of looking at that experience. I feel like you can take it all in and appreciate what they did and not even talk about me. I was just sitting at home. But I get how it is.”

There was reported speculation that Golden State's title contributed to his trade request from the Nets this past offseason.

“That’s my family over there,” he says. “I can be a Brooklyn Net and y’all can be the Golden State Warriors, and it’ll still be love. ... When they succeed, I succeed, because I’m a part of that history forever.”

From 2011 until 2019, Durant's teams finished no worse than the Conference Finals in all but one season he was able to finish. In his first two healthy seasons with the Nets, Durant has won one playoff series. But Durant doesn't regret his decision to leave the Warriors for Brooklyn. 

“It was another pivot,” Durant said of leaving Golden State. “I just wanted to play ball somewhere else. But a lot of people see it as I’m chasing something. And I think it probably stems when I said, ‘I don’t want to be number two no more.’ I was number two in high school, in the draft. But what I had to explain to people was, I had just lost in the Finals. I wanted to go back and win the Finals. It wasn’t about: ‘I want to be the best ever. I want to be better than LeBron or [Michael Jordan].’ I don’t give a s--- about that. I want to wake up every day and do what I do. If we win, I know that stuff comes with me being the best that I can be.”

Steve Kerr is taking over the reins from Gregg Popovich as the head coach of USA Basketball. Kerr is hoping a familiar face will join his squad at the 2024 Olympics in Paris.

Kerr joked that he'd make a "recruiting pitch" to Kevin Durant of the Brooklyn Nets to join Team USA for another run. Durant and Kerr were previously together on the Golden State Warriors. Durant has said it's too early for him to commit to playing in the next Olympics.

Durant has played for Team USA in three different Olympics. He's helped lead the United States to the gold medal in the 2012, 2016 and 2020 (played in 2021) games. Durant is also the all-time leading scorer in Team USA history.

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