Olympic Games 2024 live updates: Latest news as the countdown ...

"To wave the flag for, not only for us as a men’s national team, but for all the Olympians, I hold that with the utmost honor," says basketball legend LeBron James after the announcement earlier Monday that he will carry the Team USA flag at the Paris Olympics opening ceremony this Friday.

"It’s very easy [for it] to be humbling when... [it's]something that you never dreamed about before," the Los Angeles Lakers player said.

Reminiscing about his childhood ahead of his fourth Olympic games, the 39-year-old athlete explained that "[from] being a kid from the inner city in Akron, Ohio, to being able to represent our country in a whole other country, in Paris and in France, it’s just... a loss of words, something that you never dreamed of. It’s an absolute honor."

He added: "I hope I continue to make my community proud and continue to make my family proud."

Ece Yildirim, CNBC and Lillian Rizzo, CNBC

Sportsbooks and daily fantasy operators are preparing for a Summer Olympics bump.

The games in Paris, set to start Friday, will be the first to take place since legal gambling became widespread in the U.S. The gaming industry expects an increase in wagering from the previous Summer Games in Tokyo, particularly for sports like men’s and women’s basketball, soccer and tennis.

“The Olympics and gambling, for decades, have looked at each other from afar. This year we’ll see them meld together,” said Max Bichsel, North America executive vice president at Gambling.com Group.

These Olympic Games come at an opportune time for sportsbooks, during the offseasons of high-volume betting leagues like the NFL and NBA. But it remains to be seen whether they move the needle for gambling operators.

Read the full story here.

On behalf of nonprofit Gold Meets Golden and partner Samsung, country music singer Blake Shelton surprised Tokyo bronze medalist Jagger Eaton with a send-off message of encouragement ahead of Paris 2024.

Keir Simmons

PARIS — Basketball legend LeBron James will serve as a flag bearer for Team USA, it was exclusively announced on NBC News' “TODAY” this morning. 

The Los Angeles Lakers star who signed a deal to remain with the franchise earlier this month will hold the Stars and Stripes in the opening ceremony in Paris on Friday.  

James will be playing in his fourth Games, having won a bronze medal in 2004 and gold in 2008 and 2012. When asked why he’s returning to Olympic play, James said he still owes it to give it his all.

"At this point in my career, I still, I have a lot to give, and Team USA has given a lot to me, so I feel like it’s an opportunity for me to give back,” he told the "TODAY" show’s Craig Melvin earlier this month.

The 2024 Paris Olympics will take on a particularly special meaning for Brittney Griner.

The WNBA star will be competing for her country for the third time in Paris — and the first time since she was detained in Russia on drug charges for almost 10 months in 2022.

“BG is locked in and ready to go,” Griner told NBC News on Friday. “I’m happy, I’m in a great place. I’m representing my country, the country that fought for me to come back. I’m gonna represent it well.”

Griner will also be competing in Paris for the first time as a parent. She and her wife had a son, Bash, on July 8. Griner isn’t thrilled to be leaving him so soon, but said since he’s growing up in a sports family, one day he’ll understand. 

“Every minute, I feel like he’s popping into my head,” Griner said. “Literally everything revolves around him. And I love it.”

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Keir Simmons

PARIS — The French capital has been transformed into an Olympic playground. Beach volleyball will be played under the Eiffel Tower and BMX freestyle, skateboarding and 3X3 basketball will take place at the Place de la Concorde.

The famous square in front of L’Hotel de Ville has been turned into a place where the public can try Olympic and Paralympic sports such as basketball and wheelchair tennis, and fathers can wrestle with their children on a makeshift Olympic mat. 

Camille and Jean-Francois Grout, are Parisians who unlike some have chosen to stay in the capital, braving the crowds and the traffic during the games. 

“It’s quite amazing to have the Games in our city,” Camille, 50, told NBC News today.

Paris and the teams descending on it are still getting prepped for the Games to get underway Wednesday. When they do, you'll be able to stream every minute on Peacock.

Wednesday's events will be in men's soccer and men's rugby sevens. For the uninitiated, rugby sevens is like regular rugby union (one of the sports in which football has its roots). The difference is that instead of the usual 15-player teams playing 40-minute halves, sevens has seven-player teams playing seven-minute halves.

In soccer, Argentina will no doubt be one of the teams to watch out for Wednesday. Fresh from their Copa America win, Argentina's young squad (almost all players in Olympic soccer must be under 23) includes Manchester City's Julián Álvarez and Inter Miami's Federico Redondo. They open the Games against Morocco at 9:00 a.m. ET, while Spain plays Uzbekistan.

The USA will play France at 3:00 p.m. ET and the USMNT's overage players include Nashville's Walker Zimmerman, Cincinatti's Miles Robinson and Djordje Mihailovic of the Colorado Rapids.

Under blue skies and bright sunshine, curious Parisians gathered along the right bank of the Seine to see the French capital’s mayor plunge into the water.

After months of anticipation, a smiling Anne Hidalgo fulfilled a promise to show it was clean enough to host open swimming competitions during the 2024 Olympics and the opening ceremony on the river, at the time nine days away.

Clad in a wetsuit and goggles, she plunged into the river near Paris’ imposing City Hall, her office, and the Notre Dame Cathedral.

Hidalgo’s swim was part of a broader effort to showcase the river’s improved cleanliness ahead of the Games, which are set to kick off Friday with a lavish open-air ceremony that includes an athletes’ parade on boats on the Seine.Read the full story here.

They have the best seats in the house for this summer’s Paris Olympics, but they won’t be enjoying the sports.

Maj. John and Col. Dry will be the eyes in the sky for one of the most challenging and stringent security operations ever deployed at the Games.

NBC News got an exclusive invite in March week to board their military police helicopter as they swooped over the sprawling Chateau de Versailles, the former royal residence now hosting equestrian events, to La Defense business district. Then along the river Seine, the scene of the opening ceremony, to the Olympic stadium, the Stade de France, and the multicolored townhouses of the suburban Olympic Village.

Read the full story here.

In the summer of 1924, more than 600,000 spectators descended on Paris for the Olympic Games. The competitions were broadcast on the radio for the first time, allowing listeners around the world to vicariously experience the “Flying Finns” of track and field and other elite athletes. The British stars Harold Abrahams and Eric Liddell triumphed on the track, inspiring the 1981 Oscar-winning film “Chariots of Fire” and a soaring electronic theme by Vangelis.

In the century since, Paris and its surrounding cities have been utterly transformed by political upheaval, technological revolution and demographic shifts. But when the City of Lights hosts the Games for a third time this month, spectators and television audiences will be reminded how much has remained the same, from the towering landmarks of metropolitan Paris to the pageantry of the opening ceremony.

See the photos here.