This week starts one of the main basketball events of the year, the World Championship. During 16 days of play, viewers will see the young team from the USA, the European stars of the NBA and all the teams that will try their luck in qualifying for the 2024 Olympic Games. In this material we will tell you everything you need know before the start of the world championship.
This year it is organized by three Asian states at once: the Philippines, Japan and Indonesia. This is the first time in basketball history that the world championship has been held in multiple countries.
Format
The tournament has two group stages. And in the first stage the following eight quartets were formed:
Group AB GroupGroup CGroup DGroup EGroup FGroup GGroup HAngola Dominican Republic Philippines Italy South Sudan Serbia China Puerto Rico United States Jordan Greece New Zealand Egypt Mexico Montenegro Lithuania Germany Finland Australia Japan Slovenia Cape Verde Georgia Venezuela Iran Spain Ivory Coast Brazil Canada Latvia Lebanon France
The two best teams from each of them will form four more groups: I, J, K and L. The teams that occupy the first and second place in them will go to the quarterfinals of the tournament.
Those teams that placed third or fourth in the first stage will also advance to the second, but will fight for places 17-32 in groups M, N, O and P.
Since the tournament takes place in three countries at once, each of them will host several fours. Groups A, B, C, D, I, M, J and N will play in two different stadiums in Manila, while Okinawa will host quartets E, F, K and O and Jakarta will host groups G, H, L And p.
The playoffs will also take place in Manila. In the intervals between their legs, the losers in the quarterfinals will decide among themselves the fate of the fifth to eighth places.
world cup 2023
Photo: FRANCIS R. MALASIG/EPA/TASS
Schedule
The first group stage begins on Friday, August 25 and ends on Wednesday, August 30. Two matches will open the tournament at once, which will start at the same time (11:00 Moscow time): Finland – Australia and Italy – Angola.
The second group stage will take place from August 31 to September 3, the playoffs – from September 5 to 10. In total, the teams will play 92 matches in the tournament, with the decider starting on September 10 at 3:40 p.m. Moscow time.
The full championship schedule and each individual game day can be found here:
What does the 2024 Olympics have to do with it?
The start of the Summer Olympics, which will be held in Paris in 2024, is almost a year away. But for basketball teams, it is the upcoming World Championship that will become the main qualifying stage for the Olympic Games.
The top two teams from each region (Europe, Americas, Africa, Asia and Oceania) will join the tournament host, France, at the Games next summer.
Who to follow
An impressive number of popular players will miss the World Cup this year: Giannis Antetokounmpo will not play for Greece, Nikola Jokic for Serbia, Viktor Vembanyama for France and Domantas Sabonis for Lithuania. But that doesn’t mean there won’t be big names in the tournament.
The top favourites, of course, are the US team, although their composition won’t be as stellar as it could be. But the US team will definitely have someone to watch: there will be Minnesota star Anthony Edwards, last season’s best defensive player Jaren Jackson Jr., rookie of the year Paolo Bankero and others.
As for other teams, then, of course, it is worth noting Slovenia and France. They will include Dallas superstar Luka Doncic and Minnesota three-time DPOY Rudy Gobert. At last year’s EuroBasket, we already saw what they are capable of: Gobert won silver and entered the symbolic five at the end of the tournament, and Doncic scored a record 47 points against his France.
Impossible not to mention the Canadian team, whose leader will be Shay Gilges-Alexander. Last season he scored 31.4 points per game on average and entered the top five symbolic in the NBA according to his results.
Ten current NBA players will play as part of the Australian national team at one time: Xavier Cooks (Washington), Dyson Daniels (New Orleans), Josh Green, Dante Exam (both from Dallas), Josh Giddy, Patti Mills, Jack White ( all from Oklahoma), Joe Ingles (Orlando), Jock Landale (Houston), and Matisse Tibull (Portland).
The next World Cup will also feature:
Lauri Markkanen (Utah) – Finland; Nikola Vucevic (Chicago) – Montenegro; Yuta Watanabe (Phoenix) – Japan; Jordan Clarkson (Utah) – Philippines; Franz and Mo Wagner (both – Orlando) is Germany.
jordan clarkson
Photo: Ezra Acayan/Getty Images
Favorites
According to the official FIBA ranking, the 12 best participating teams are the following:
United States, France, Australia, Slovenia, Germany, Spain, Canada, Italy, Serbia, Dominican Republic, Finland, Lithuania.
