FIBA will look to ease travel burdens at 2023 World Cup

BEIJING — FIBA will look at adjusting travel demands on teams at the next World Cup, after this tournament in China led to many complaints about the distances that nations participating in the knockout stages had to cover without much time to prepare for games.

Some teams faced major travel challenges at the tournament’s most crucial time. And multiple nations argued that the semifinal-game winners — Spain and Argentina — benefited from having two days off before those matchups, while semifinal losers Australia and France had only one day.

FIBA contended that playing a tournament-record 92 games in 16 days across eight cities meant some logistical headaches were inevitable. And with the next World Cup in 2023 set to be spread out over three countries — Indonesia, Japan and the Philippines — more challenges are likely then as well.

“After having experienced it, on paper sometimes it looks perfect,” FIBA Secretary General Andreas Zagklis said. “Then you see the imperfect aspects of it. These are the things we’re ready to improve in the future.”

Serbia coach Sasha Djordjevic, who resigned from his national team on Saturday, said the rest factor should be equal going forward. He also thought cramming so many games into such a short time span affected the quality of play as the tournament went along.

“Give the same conditions to all the competitors to have the same rest days, the same conditions to compete,” Djordjevic said. “After 15 days of games and games and game, and back to back … you need that rest to give your best basketball.”


In other matters addressed by Zagklis on Sunday:

USA STRUGGLE

Zagklis was asked his reaction to many top NBA players not making the trip to China for the World Cup, which is one of the reasons why the U.S. — which had won the last two titles at the event — finished only seventh in China, its lowest finish ever at a World Cup or Olympic event.

“It’s not our job to put together the roster of any of the 32 teams,” Zagklis said. “We set the stage, the conditions for all the teams and then each national federation has its own way of approaching the players and having them commit to play for the national team.”

Zagklis also said many nations, with the exception of the U.S. and Canada, brought most of their top NBA players.


BOGUT PROBE

Australia center Andrew Bogut complained loudly and profanely after his team’s semifinal loss to Spain, calling FIBA a “disgrace” and alleging that a call late in regulation against the Boomers cheated them of a spot in the gold-medal game.

Australia lost to Spain in double overtime. Bogut played in Sunday’s bronze-medal game, which Australia lost to France, but FIBA will still complete an inquiry into what he said and may take disciplinary action.

“We do have a very specific set of regulations and a set of principles,” Zagklis said. “Where these lines are crossed, we have a disciplinary procedure and in this case there will be a disciplinary procedure.”

OLYMPIC QUALIFYING

There will be 24 teams competing next year for the last four available spots in the men’s basketball tournament at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. The U.S., Spain, France, Argentina, Nigeria, Iran, Australia and the host Japanese have already grabbed eight of the 12 slots in the field.

Zagklis said FIBA doesn’t plan to take long before announcing dates and sites for the four six-team tournaments that will decide those spots. The winner of each of those tournaments qualify for Tokyo.

Interested nations will have the right to bid to host one of the qualifiers, and will have to pay a hosting fee if selected.

Zagklis said the tournaments will take place on multiple continents, since both FIBA and the International Olympic Committee want the game exposed to as many parts of the world as possible.

source: sports.inquirer.net

Age-defying Luis Scola propels Argentina towards World Cup glory

Luis Scola is 39, his hair has more than a few streaks of grey and at the Basketball World Cup in China he has shared the court with rivals half his age.

But Argentina’s evergreen captain is playing a big part in the country’s bid to win the world crown for the first time since the inaugural edition in 1950.

He was named player of the game in Sunday’s 91-65 victory over Poland, drilling 21 points to propel Argentina into a quarter-final showdown with title-contenders Serbia on Tuesday.

The forward was also named best player against Nigeria for registering a double-double, scoring 23 points and 10 rebounds.

The last member of Argentina’s so-called “Golden Generation” who won the Olympics in 2004, Scola has won every major trophy in international basketball, except the World Cup.

“What age are you talking about, I’m 28, right?” he joked after Argentina swatted aside Venezuela in the second round.

Speaking in an unmistakably American accent, a product of spending a decade in the NBA up until 2017, Scola added: “I understand everybody talking about my age, but my brain does not function that way.

“I am not going to the court and thinking, oh my god, I’m older than these guys, or, oh my god, these guys are five, 10, 15 years younger than me.

“To me, it’s natural.

“I just think that I’m a player, I am a good player and I’m going to make good plays and help my team win.”

‘No goodbye tour’

However much he tries to avoid it, talk about his age and how much longer he can plod on for is never far away.


Scola, who spent the last two seasons in Chinese basketball, is featuring in a record-equalling fifth World Cup.

Last week he reached another milestone when his heroics against Nigeria moved him up to second on the FIBA World Cup all-time scoring list, trailing only the legendary Brazilian Oscar Schmidt.

If that was a proud moment, there is the growing prospect that Argentina could be in for a shout of at least a medal, although Serbia will present a mighty challenge despite losing to Spain on Sunday.

That same day, Scola shared the court with the youngest player in the tournament, Poland’s 18-year-old Aleksander “Olek” Balcerowski.

Scola had said that what happens at the World Cup will dictate if he would carry on for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.

Doing so would have a nice symmetry because he is the only remaining member of the Argentina team that stunned the USA on the way to Olympic gold at Athens 2004.

He was also in the team which won silver at the 2002 World Cup.

Asked what it was like to now be the grandfather of a team whose average age is 27, younger than most other rosters at the World Cup, Scola replied: “This is not like a tour or a goodbye week.

“This is a world championship and we are trying to go all the way to the medals.

“We don’t do maths with the ages.”

source: sports.inquirer.net

Serbia shows US how it’s done at Fiba World Cup

Red-hot Serbia showed they — not reigning two-time champions the United States — are the team to beat at the Basketball World Cup with a 92-77 victory over Italy on Wednesday to top their group.

Gregg Popovich’s Team USA was pushed to the limit on Tuesday before finally swatting aside 17th-ranked Turkey in overtime to labor into the second round in China.


Just 24 hours later Serbia showed the Americans how to do it against the Italians, ranked 13th, in a battle for supremacy in Group D with both teams having already stormed through to the next stage.

In the next round, Italy and Serbia will be in a group with Spain and Puerto Rico.

Serbia was ahead at half-time against Italy in Foshan with the Sacramento Kings pair of Nemanja Bjelica and Bogdan Bogdanovic roaring to the fore.

Guard Bogdanovic totted up a game-leading 31 points and five steals. Bjelica, a forward, had nine assists.


The United States is the current Olympic and world champions but they look fallible in China with Popovich missing the Americans’ biggest names, forcing him to select a young, experimental team.

In contrast, Serbia — losers to the US in the last Olympic and world finals — are a settled side who know their jobs and what coach Sasha Djordjevic expects of them.

Serbia, the tallest team at the World Cup, racked up more than 100 points in handsome victories over outclassed Angola and the Philippines in their opening two matches.

source: sports.inquirer.net