MADRID, 27 Nov. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Poland, Finland, Bahamas, Angola and Lebanon will be the rivals of the Spanish team in the Pre-Olympic Championship that Valencia will host between July 2 and 7, 2024, according to the draw held this Monday.
The team coached by Sergio Scariolo, which started in pot 1 along with Latvia, Lithuania and Slovenia, had some luck and avoided the theoretically most powerful rivals for a tournament where only the winner will have the ticket to be in the Paris Games next year and in which it will have its status as host in its favor.
At the moment, hours before the draw he already had the bonus of being chosen one of the four hosts along with Latvia (Riga), Greece (Athens) and Puerto Rico (San Juan) so he was not going to have the Greek team in his way. and the threat of Giannis Antetokounmpo or to an always competitive and tough Puerto Rican team.
Then, when it came to defining the pairings, they avoided dangerous rivals such as Italy, which was in pot 2, the Dominican Republic, which was in pot 3, and Croatia, which was in pot 5, although the tournament will require them not to have any Bad day if he doesn’t want to be absent from the Games for the first time since Atlanta’96.
To do this, Spain will first have to deal with a theoretically affordable group in which it will face the African Angola and the Asian Lebanon and with the objective of finishing in the top two to advance to the semifinals where, depending on its position, it will meet already with the most powerful teams of their Pre-Olympic.
In Group B in Valencia there will be old acquaintances like Poland and Finland. The Polish team has always given him ‘war’ in the last confrontations and even defeated him (69-80) in the February 2020 ‘window’ of qualification for the Eurobasket held in Zaragoza, although Scariolo’s team did not have the Euroleague and The NBA then. The Finnish team, led by NBA Lauri Markkanen, has grown a lot and already gave them a scare in the quarterfinals of the last continental event where Spain had to overcome a great disadvantage.
The group is completed by one of the surprises of this draw. The modest Bahamas, which has already demonstrated its danger by leaving Paris out of the race for Argentina and which has in its ranks NBA players of proven level such as point guard Eric Gordon (Phoenix Suns) or center Deandre Ayton (Portland Trail Blazers).
Of the rest of the Pre-Olympics, the one of ‘death’ will undoubtedly be the one played in Athens where Luka Doncic’s Slovenia and Giannis Antetokounmpo’s Greece fell, and with other competitive rivals such as Croatia and the Dominican Republic, in addition to New Zealand and Egypt.
In Riga, Latvia will try to confirm its status as revelation of the past Mundobasket with Georgia, Brazil and Montenegro as theoretical main rivals, while in San Juan (Puerto Rico), the hosts will want to assert the ‘court factor’ against the European Lithuania and Italy.
The team coached by Sergio Scariolo has been lucky and has avoided the theoretically most powerful rivals for a tournament where only the winner will have the ticket to be in the Paris Games next year and in which they will have their status as host.
To do this, Spain will first have to deal with a group in which it will face Angola and Lebanon, where it will have to finish among the first two to advance to the semifinals where it will meet the two best among Poland, Finland and the Bahamas.
–DRAW FOR THE MEN’S BASKETBALL PRE-OLYMPICS.
PRE-OLYMPIC VALENCIA.
Group A: SPAIN, Lebanon and Angola.
Group B: Poland, Finland and the Bahamas.
PREOLYMPIC RIGA.
Group A: Latvia, Georgia and the Philippines.
Group B: Brazil, Montenegro and Cameroon.
ATHENS PRE-OLYMPIC.
Group A: Slovenia, New Zealand and Croatia.
Group B: Greece, Dominican Republic and Egypt.
SAN JUAN PRE-OLYMPIC.
Group A: Lithuania, Mexico and Ivory Coast.
Group B: Puerto Rico, Italy and Bahrain.
2023-11-27 18:41:17
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