PARIS, France — With 9.8 seconds on the clock in regulation and the Boomers trailing by two points, everyone in the building knew who was taking the shot.

When Duop Reath handed Patty Mills the ball near halfcourt, there were 8.6 seconds left. Curling to the right wing, three-time NBA MVP Nikola Jokic switched onto the Australian.

Cut off going right, Mills dribbled left towards the free-throw line, losing the handle for a moment, before gathering and immediately pulling up for a fadeaway jumper from just above the left elbow.

When the ball left his fingertips, the right hand of Jokic was right in his face, the clock ticked under three seconds. It rattled home. Scores tied, 1.4 seconds on the clock.

Patty Mills did it again.

“He becomes a different cat when he puts on the green and gold,” head coach Brian Goorjian said with a shake of his head.

Then in overtime, it was Jokic’s turn to make the play.

With 32.1 on the clock in the extra period, Jokic backed Reath towards the block, calculated as ever. Josh Giddey lurked in the paint to help, instead the Serbian span away from Giddey towards the baseline, knocking down a trademark jumper.

Serbia closed out the game from there, 95-90, breaking the hearts of the Boomers.

“The prior teams I’ve been in the Olympics you’re playing teams and they don’t have that guy. It’s talent but they don’t have the MVP,” Goorjian said of Jokic.

“Everyone came to Paris, everyone had that guy. They make plays and that’s why they’re superstars.”

For Australia, that guy for over a decade has been Patty Mills. At 36 years of age, he threatened to do it again, but it wasn’t to be, in a result that almost certainly brings with it the end of an era.

While nothing has been confirmed, as Mills slowly shuffled his way back to the locker room, head down, it was impossible not to feel like a legendary figure in Australian Olympic history had emptied the tank in one last iconic performance for his country.

The contrast was noteworthy.

Mills appeared breathless. Certainly exhausted, but perhaps equally shocked. No stranger to Boomers heartbreak, the veteran calmly worked through his immediate thoughts postgame.

“I thought we threw everything at them. We’re playing against world class individuals, world class teams, world class coaches,” Mills said, taking a breath in between ideas.

“This is why you play international basketball, it’s a different sport than any other league across the world. It brings the best out of everyone.”

Josh Giddey on the other hand, 15 years to the junior of Mills, was experiencing this type of pain for the first time. As Mills wrapped up his interviews and headed to the locker room, Giddey stepped up, visibly fighting back tears.

“It is….” Giddey started, before taking a moment to compose himself.

“I thought we had everything in this locker room to win a tournament like this. I still do believe that,” he said.

“These tournaments come down to one or two possessions and it shows how little room for error there is. I love my teammates and our country, our coaches, everyone has poured so much into this. I think we deserve better; our fans deserve better. It’s a tough pill to swallow knowing we have to wait four more years to the next one.”

The pair combined for 51 points in total, with 33 of those coming in a first half that contained some of the most outrageous shot making you could imagine. Mills knocked down three corner jump shots from behind the backboard, while Giddey used every trick in the book to unload the full floater package, from ball fakes to spin moves to hesitation dribbles.

They all went in.

“To be honest I don’t know if there’s anything going through my mind at that stage,” Mills said of his sizzling first half shooting.

“It’s just being able to do what you rep and rep and rep and the thousands and millions of shots you practice just to have a three-minute stretch like that. No one will ever be able to understand but there’s a lot of practice.”

Quickly moving back to the big picture, every word from Mills continued to carry a reflective tone.

“We’ve just enjoyed every moment of this journey. It hasn’t been a smooth sailing ship, but you do it together,” Mills said of himself and long-term teammates Joe Ingles and Matthew Dellavedova.

“You never take those moments for granted. Through thick and thin, the ups and downs, the happy tears, the sad tears, it’s been an incredible journey to be able to share with those guys. Hopefully the legacy we will leave at some point will be able to help the younger guys for years to come.”

Unlike Mills, Giddey was able to swing a positive twist on lessons learned over the last month.

“This is a tough way to end my first one, but fortunately I’m 21 years old so I’ve got a lot of years left in the tank,” he said.

“2028 in LA we’ll be ready to go, I’ll be 25, we’ll be a lot more mature as a group, we’ve got a lot of young guys coming through. This is hurts now but it will help in the long run, fueling that fire, this is a taste that we never want to have to taste again.”

play

Why it’s the ‘end of an era’ for the Boomers after Olympic exit

Kane Pitman reacts to Australia’s quarterfinal loss to Serbia in overtime.

Listening to the young star maneuver his way through his emotions, it was hard not to think back on Dellavedova’s words outside the Olympic village in Paris just 48 hours earlier.

“I think there’s advantages to being young. Being your first time going through this, you’re kind of fearless, you haven’t felt the pain,” Dellavedova suggested.

From the old guard to the new guard, Mills and Giddey’s immediate response might not have been identical, though they both now have something in common.

Olympic heartbreak.

Walking off the floor as head coach of Australia at the Olympics for the last time, Goorjian remained steady as a rock in his delivery. Purposeful with every sentence, while also sending a message to those who doubted him and the squad.

“I hold my head high. You don’t have to be blind Freddie to know what’s going on, what people are saying,” Goorjian said.

“Myself personally in my heart and the people I care about. I’m proud of what I’ve done for Australian basketball, I’m proud of what I’ve done for the Boomers. It’s been 16 years of my life that I’ve put into this.

“In this region, never in the history has there been a medal, we got one. Then you had to make a decision of whether to start over, knowing you’d take some punches. We had a happy team, a team that stayed together through the rollercoaster ride, there was no back biting, from the guys sitting on the bench to the starters.”

While the rhetoric has been largely ignored in many circles, Goorjian has been consistent with his message if nothing else. The Boomers are a program in transition. By the time the LA Olympics roll around in 2028, every member of the Paris squad will be 30+ aside from Giddey, Daniels and Green.

“There was a process to get to that medal, I think you can see with Josh Giddey, you can see with Dyson Daniels, Josh Green, we’ve got four or five guys that are exciting for the future.

“Some of the guys like McVeigh and Magnay, they’re in that middle and they’ve never played in a worlds or Olympics. Playing in this and games like this is how you move forward. There would have to be something wrong with you if you didn’t see that. I just think we’ve been throwing punches for a long time.”

Goorjian knows full well that the masses are unlikely to embrace that line of messaging, with the fallout from the world cup right through to the loss to Serbia placing a significant weight on the Australian coaching legend.

“This is as stressful; this thing was like every game felt like the bronze medal game,” Goorjian said.

“The pressure back home, everybody has an opinion, a thought on everything you do. I just feel like every decision that was made was for the betterment of the team and for the best that we could do for the Boomers and the country. I feel very proud of where it is and how we played in the tournament.”

The Boomers will find a new coach with ease as there will be plenty of candidates interested in the opportunity. Which direction they go remains to be seen, though Basketball Australia will be hard pressed to find someone with the unwavering passion of Goorjian.

While the 26-point performance from Mills deserves to be remembered and placed in the FIBA Patty classics archive, it should also ring significant alarm bells moving forward.

For all the discussion and conjecture around the 36-year-old’s ability to be a key piece at this point in his career, the reality is, they had little alternative.

“People say the balls in his hands [too much]. [But] we don’t have another guy that does what he does,” Goorjian said.

“We have four or five that defend, can pick up the floor, are long. Dyson Daniels, Josh Green, Dante Exum. We don’t have a guy who can create shots and can get shots up under pressure and score in a half court setting.

While the late regulation heroics were exhilarating, the Boomers will walk away knowing they have to find their next perimeter scoring star in a hurry. In an era where MVP and All-Star caliber athletes are sprouting up all over the world, the recent surge in the Australian pipeline of high quality three and d guards and wings is likely not going to deliver anything more than good honest results at this level.

“Shai [Gilgeous-Alexander], when it came to push and shove, Shai got it done. When you come to Greece, Giannis [Antetokounmpo]. When you come to this, who made the plays down the stretch? Jokic,” Goorjian said.

For Australia, it’s been Patty Mills. Over and over again.

“That’s what these things get to. He can still go; he hasn’t lost a step. I’d be speaking out of turn to say he’s done, that’s out of step. He’s one of the best I’ve ever been around, the success of the Boomers to this stage, a lot goes to him,” Goorjian said.

The final word on Mills from Giddey?

“He deserved better. It was up to us to help him get that gold medal,” Giddey said.

“His legacy will never, ever be forgotten in this country, in this tournament. You talk about FIBA Patty, one of the greatest to ever do it in these tournaments. We’re very, very lucky to play with him, whether this is his last or not, it’s been an unbelievable experience to learn and be around a guy of his caliber.”

As for Mills on Giddey?

“Unbelievable talent. The Boomers are in great hands.”

One monumental chapter almost certainly closed in Paris on Tuesday afternoon, with the next bringing a four-year burning question with it.

How can Patty Mills be replaced?