Paul hurt as US Olympic team gathers

USA Basketball chairman Jerry Colangelo said Paul "tweaked" a prior injury and they hope he will be back on court on Saturday.

Injuries have already cut the list of 20 candidates to 14 healthy ones, with such stars as center Dwight Howard, guards Derrick Rose and Dwyane Wade, and forward Chris Bosh -- a third of the likely Olympians -- out of London consideration.

What remains is the core from two US championship lineups -- the 2008 Beijing Olympic squad that reclaimed gold after the Americans finished third in 2004, and the 2010 world championship squad that won the title at Istanbul.

LeBron James, coming off his first NBA title with Miami, was joined by 2008 teammates Kobe Bryant, Carmelo Anthony, Paul and Deron Williams on the squad once again guided by Duke University coach Mike Krzyzewski.

NBA scoring champion Kevin Durant and Oklahoma City teammate Russell Westbrook, who lost to Miami in the final, will be joined by 2010 world teammates Tyson Chandler and Kevin Love, two vital big men for the Americans.

Other candidates include Blake Griffin, Andre Iguodala, Rudy Gay, James Harden and Eric Gordon.

Colangelo said he would discuss the roster with the coaching staff on Friday night but would put off any judgments until after Saturday's practice.

The squad is to be announced on Saturday night.

"Tonight we'll have some deliberations about what took place today, but we're still not making the final decision until we practice tomorrow," Colangelo said. "We told the players we were going to do that and we're not going to change."

The training camp will run through Thursday, ending with a game against the Dominican Republic. The Americans then train for three days in Washington before facing Brazil and then train two days in Manchester, England, before taking on the British Olympic squad.

Twenty years after the original US Olympic Dream Team played in Barcelona, the latest incarnation of US NBA Olympic talent will return for exhibition games against Argentina on July 22 and Spain on July 24, the latter a showdown of the Olympic gold medal favorites.