PARIS — Spencer Lee turned to his right and gave a thumbs up as he stepped toward the medal podium Friday night inside Champ de Mars Arena. 

He put on a smile and stood in for the dozens of photo requests that came his way during the Olympic awards ceremony, tough as it was for him to do so with a silver medal hanging around his neck. 

“First thing I thought of was to take it off, but that’s OK, right?” Lee said. “You can get a laugh out of that, right? I don’t even have it anymore. I gave it to my sister. I don’t even know where it is.” 

Medaling was not Lee’s mission in Paris. He was chasing gold and nearly got it. 

But a second-period flurry tipped in favor of Japan’s Rei Higuchi and, with it, so did the 57-kilogram men’s freestyle gold medal match. 

For Higuchi, it was redemption from Rio. He was a fresh-on-the-scene 20-year-old in 2016 when he dropped a narrow defeat in the gold medal match. 

“It hasn’t been a smooth road,” Higuchi told the Japanese media in Paris. “I’ve passed through a setback and despair, but I managed to succeed by believing myself.”

It hasn’t been a smooth road for Lee, either. The 25-year-old battled back from injuries that kept him off the Senior circuit the past five years, including ACL repairs on both knees that cost him a shot at making the U.S. team for Tokyo. 

But this year showed the promise that made him a three-time age-group World champion and one of America’s most hyped prospects before his arrival onto the college scene at the University of Iowa. He took out 2021 World champ Thomas Gilman in two straight matches to win the Olympic Trials, secured his spot in Paris by winning the World Olympic Games Qualifier and stormed into Friday night’s finals match by registering technical superiority blowouts in the quarterfinals and semis. 

“When I was fighting with him, I could feel his power,” Higuchi said. “He’s very powerful, very speedy, very physically fit as well. I was aware of that, but what impressed me most was his power and strength.”

In the finals, however, Lee couldn’t get his high-octane offense going against Higuchi. He scored a pair of first-period step-out points but never had the chance to utilize his dynamic top-position skills. 

“I’m a guy who believes more than wins and losses it’s about effort, and I don’t think I put a lot of effort into that match,” Lee said. “I didn’t deserve to win today, and that’s OK. 

“Honestly, (I needed to) create a lot more action, force him to wrestle me. Yeah, he scored one scramble, but I think action favors me and I let him hang on my hand and just stand there. He won one scramble and that was it.” 

That scramble was replaying on television monitor as Lee made the long walk back from the competition floor to the warmup area connected to Champ de Mars Arena after the match. He stopped for a second to give it another look and then continued. 

In the end, it might have been the difference between gold and silver — between euphoria and dejection. 

“I don’t think there will ever be perspective where I think (silver is) good,” Lee said. “Twenty years from now you try to name the Olympic silver medalist and I bet you can’t. It’s because no one cares.” 

A reporter in the media scrum asked Lee whether he’s given any thought yet to taking another shot at Olympic gold four years from now in Los Angeles. 

“We’ll see, man,” Lee said. “I’m still figuring out whether I want to keep wrestling or if I want to (do something else). A lot of time and effort put into getting back into a healthy enough state to wrestle and then I go and I fail. We’ll figure it out from here.”