It’s time for the 22nd edition since the start in 2005 of the Baltic Sea Basketball Cup for Sweden’s, Finland’s, Estonia’s and Latvia’s U16 and U18 national teams in Tallinn.
The BSBC had started earlier as a tournament for the four men’s national teams. The background was that Sweden, as organizer of the European Championship 2003, did not participate in the European Championship qualifiers. The idea was raised to have more matches with our neighboring countries. Both cost-effective, short journeys and sporting good, as the four countries were at roughly the same level.
Sweden and Finland have traditionally enjoyed good cooperation. During the 90s, it was concretized through the Swedish-Finnish League, NEBL and for one year also a joint U-national team in summer leagues in the USA.
When Estonia and Latvia were positive about the BSBC idea, we set up two tournaments a year, one in June and one in the middle days of December, where the organizers cycled between the four countries.
In June 2002, the first BSBC was played in Espoo, Finland. This was followed by BSBC in Tallinn, Norrköping and Riga. The collaboration worked well. It became natural to extend the BSBC also to the women’s and youth national teams.
For the U-national teams, the premiere took place in 2005. It was agreed that Tallinn was a good venue and in order for Estonia to have an opportunity to build up the event, it was decided that Tallinn would be the venue for the first three years. We analyzed the calendar together. There were school holidays in all four countries before Epiphany. In addition, it was a good time to test players in a sharp position before the summer youth European Championship. Tallinn was the perfect venue. Minimum total travel for all teams combined, relatively low costs, good facilities and an excellent organization, meant that the four confederations decided that Tallinn would become a permanent venue.
The men’s and women’s BSBC continued to be played for a few years but when FIBA changed the calendar, it was harder to find dates and the tournaments were put on hold. Before that, the BSBC for both men and women had been played as a joint event in Malmö in 2006.
With the exception of a few tournaments, the four countries have participated every time. Latvia was replaced a couple of times by other countries.
Over the years, scores of future superstars have played in the BSBC. Therefore, the tournament is now well attended by agents, colleges and clubs.
Several of the associations also provide training to BSBC. It is an excellent opportunity to see many matches, meet youth national team coaches and colleagues.
11 of Sweden’s 12 players in this summer’s EC for ladies, have played BSBC. Lollo Halvarsson is one of those who made several BSBCs, but she was also involved several years later. In the Audentes hall, a large BSBC sweep was made with photos of four players, one from each country.
On one occasion, the undersigned and Per Källman made an attempt to calculate what the corresponding number of matches for our youth national teams would have cost without the BSBC concept, but the differences were so great that we were content to state that. Then multiplying by four (for all federations), one realizes how much there is to gain from creating common and regular tournaments of this kind.
BSBC became a win-win-win-win project, where all four associations were winners.
The idea is not unique. Already in the 60s, a Baltic Cup was arranged, even though Latvia and Estonia were then still occupied by the Soviet Union. But Swedish Secretary General Ali Strunke, with a Latvian accent, knew how to handle it all.
Since then, many have stated that it would be a good idea to resume the Baltic Cup.
But the job, as you know, is not done to make it a reality. “It takes two to tango”, they say. There were four of us here.
What pleased me when we built BSBC was the positive consensus that existed. In that context, I would like to mention Latvia’s former chairman Ojars Kehris, Estonia’s former general secretary Viktor Hütt, Finland’s “engines” Henrik Dettmann and Ari Tammivaara and not least our own Per Källman. Without these, BSBC would never have existed.
And without Keio Kuhi and Anneliis Annus in Estonia, the BSBC in Tallinn would never have been so well organized. They set the level for the arrangements.
/ Lasse Nordmalm
Who was also among the founders of the Baltic Sea Basketball Cup and was also chairman of the BSBC Committee for the first ten years
