Olympic basketball overtime rules, explained: Extra period time length, timeouts, and more

2024-08-08
2 min read
(NBA Entertainment)

There are a handful of differences between the NBA and Olympic basketball.

The quarter length, court size, 3-point line distance, and the ball, itself, are just a few examples. But what about overtime?

We've only seen two overtime games at the 2024 Paris Olympics so far. France defeated Japan in OT in the Group Stage and Serbia eliminated Australia in OT in the quarterfinals.

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We nearly saw Germany take France to overtime in the semifinals, but the host country held on to advance to the gold medal match.

Will we get another overtime game before the tournament comes to a close? The Sporting News has you covered with the OT rules just in case.

MORE: Ranking all 108 U.S. men's basketball Olympians since the 1992 Dream Team

Olympic basketball overtime rules, explained

Olympic basketball uses 10-minute quarters — two minutes shorter than the NBA. Its overtime length, however, is the same. 

Olympic overtime is five minutes long. Just like the NBA, team fouls carry over.

The only difference is that in Olympic overtime, teams are only given one timeout per extra period. Timeouts from regulation do not carry over. (In the NBA, teams are given two timeouts and their short timeout can be carried over if unused).

These rules remain the same if the game needs more than one overtime period to decide the outcome. Five-minute periods, team fouls carry over, and one timeout per OT.

You can find the other rule differences between the NBA and Olympic rules here.