Procedure for official draw of the 2014 FIBA Basketball World Cup
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BARCELONA, Spain - Here is the procedure for the Official Draw of the 2014 FIBA Basketball World Cup taking place on Monday 3 February at 7pm (CET).
- The 24 teams have been classified on the basis of the FIBA Ranking Men as well as geographical principles with teams from the same continent being evenly distributed in six teams pots. Teams will be picked from these pots and placed into the four Preliminary Round groups – A, B, C and D.
• Pot 1: Argentina, Lithuania, Spain and USA. This pot consists of the top four teams in FIBA’s Men Ranking (#1 USA; #2 Spain; #3 Argentina; #4 Lithuania).
For the next five pots, the sequence does not reflect the strength of the teams:
• Pot 2: Angola, Egypt, Senegal and Finland.
• Pot 3: Iran, Korea, Philippines and New Zealand.
• Pot 4: Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia and Ukraine.
• Pot 5: Brazil, Dominican Republic, Mexico and Puerto Rico.
• Pot 6: Australia, France, Greece and Turkey.
- There are four other pots, called A, B, C and D. Each one contains numbers 1 to 6. These numbers will determine the position of each team within their Preliminary Round group and the subsequent order of games. The position of a team placed in Group A is determined by the number drawn from Pot A, Group B is from Pot B, Group C from Pot C and Group D from Pot D.
Three of the teams pots are special:
• Pot 1: As per the competition system, the teams ranked 1 (USA) and 2 (Spain) in the FIBA Ranking Men will be placed in either half of the draw. Therefore Spain will be in Group A and the USA in Group C. Argentina and Lithuania will then be drawn into either Group B or Group D.
• Pot 2: In order to balance the geographical principles, Finland shall not be placed in a Group that already contains a European team and therefore will be drawn in a Group with the USA or Argentina.
• Pot 6: in order to balance the geographical principles, Australia shall not be placed in a Group containing New Zealand and shall be placed in one of the Groups that already contain two European teams.
- When all teams have been drawn and placed in each Group, FIBA shall assign one group to each city.
Click here for more information on the competition system of the 2014 FIBA Basketball World Cup.
The Official Draw will be streamed live on livebasketball.tv and on youtube.com/fiba.
From FIBA (http://www.fiba.com/pages/eng/fe/14/wcm/news/p/nid/71243/article.html)
Meet Gilas’ prelims opponents in the 2014 FIBA World Cup: Croatia
By Noel Zarate
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Croatia's players celebrate during EuroBasket 2013 last September.
With the release of the schedule of the upcoming group stages of the 2014 FIBA World Cup in Spain, Gilas Pilipinas will attempt to crash into the second round in what many experts believe to be the second most difficult group in the tournament.
I, like a handful of others, would have preferred that the Philippines landed in Group C (USA, Turkey, Dominican Republic, New Zealand, Finland and Ukraine) or even Group D (Slovenia, Lithuania, Angola, Mexico and Australia—Korea was the FIBA Asia zone qualifier that was drawn here). But Dino Radja’s hand pulled out the miniature FIBA ball that contained the name of the Philippines when FIBA Sports Director Lubomir Kotleba asked for which team in Pot 3 will be placed in Group B and so we’re stuck with Argentina, Croatia, Puerto Rico, Senegal and Greece.
The Philippines needs to win at least twice in the group stages to advance to the second round. While being placed in this group may have made that task a little bit more exigent, there still could be a chance that coach Chot Reyes may be able to orchestrate an uprising by the boys and pull the rug from under at least two of the favored nations.
This series is dedicated to breaking down (in almost minute detail) the would-be opponents of the Filipinos and attempt to find a weakness in the opposition—if any.
Here’s the official Philippine schedule, all games to be held at the Palacio Municipal de Deportes San Pablo in Sevilla:
August 30—Croatia (Eurobasket, 4th place)
August 31—Greece (Wild Card-Eurobasket 11th place)
September 1—Argentina (FIBA Americas, 3rd place)
September 2—Rest Day
September 3—Puerto Rico (FIBA Americas, 2nd place)
September 4—Senegal (FIBA Africa, 3rd place)
The results of the group stages will determine if Gilas will be playing in the second round—which begins on September 6th—against another qualifier from Group A in what will later be called Group E.
Let’s check out the opposition starting with Croatia.
August 30—PHI vs. CRO
Right off the bat, the boys face a tough opponent.
This is a proud basketball nation since its split with Yugoslavia decades ago. Croatia was actually the Dream Team’s opponent in the gold medal match of the 1992 Barcelona Olympics thanks primarily to Vlade Divac and the firepower of Peja Danilovic.
Over the years, the Croats have evolved to be one of the powerhouses of European basketball and their present roster boasts of a number of quality players in Ante Tomic, 26, of the powerhouse FC Barcelona squad in ACB Liga Endesa as well as Bojan Bogdanovic, 24, and Luka Zoric, 28, who have also been tearing it up in their years in the European circuit.
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Croatia's Bojan Bogdanovic and Dontaye Draper at a EuroBasket 2013 game last September.
Their naturalized player is American point guard Dontaye Draper from Charleston. Draper is barely six feet tall but has the luxury of being the third string playmaker on the squad of reigning Spanish champs Real Madrid Baloncesto (RMB). He played behind the “Sergios” in RMB (Rodriguez and Llull) and pretty much picked up a number of tricks and skills from arguably two of Europe’s best point guards today. I’ve had the opportunity to broadcast some of his exploits in the past. He’s crafty, quick and has a deadly mid-range pull-up. He also drops a lot of dimes in the post and it’s also a great advantage for the Croats that Tomic (formerly of RMB) is their starting pivot as Draper is known to have him as his favorite alley-oop target (OK, maybe behind Rudy Fernandez at RMB).
Draper isn’t that utilized in RMB, hence he has not really been susceptible to any injuries and is not spent. He gained his citizenship papers in July, 2011.
But even in the Croatian squad Draper still plays back-up (albeit gets more minutes). Their starting point guard is 6’5” Roro Ukic (who is Vassilis Spanoulis’ back-up at Pannathinaikos in the Euroleague). Ukic, 28, is a deliberate playmaker with a solid set shot from behind the arc. His lack of speed is compensated by Draper’s entry, hence the American actually plays more.
National mentor Jasmin Repesa has coached this squad to three Eurobasket quarterfinals and one semis appearance since he earned the job in 2005 but was replaced by former player Josip Vrankovic in 2010. However, when Vrankovic gave Croatia its worst finish in their Eurobasket history (thirteenth in 2011) the federation rehired Repesa, compelling him to drop his ACB Liga Endesa post as the coach of Unicaja Malaga and take his act to the professional ranks in Croatia (KK Cedevita) just to keep his attention on the national team.
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Croatia's head coach Jasmin Repesa is pretty old-school.
Repesa is as old school as coaches can get. He berates his players unabashedly and has been known to bench even the team’s star if he misses a defensive assignment or even just takes a shot out of the offensive pattern’s flow. Let’s just say Unicaja found him to be an acquired taste. But now that’s back at the helm of one of Europe’s most up-and-coming basketball nations, he can concentrate on Croatia’s very realistic quest at advancing to the semis of this year’s FIBA World Cup.
That being said, the Philippines will be hard pressed to match the height and extremely high basketball IQ of this team on a mission.
Tomic is 7’2” and moves like a power forward; hence all the lobs to him for easy dunks. He was third in rebounding during the 2013 Eurobasket (7.2 RPG) and finished just a shade under Spain’s Marc Gasol and carom king Axel Hervelle of Belgium. Like Tomic, Zoric does not look to be 6’11” because of his quickness and amazing footwork. He’s got a good nose for the ball and is very slippery in the post. Zoric has a deadly step back fall-away from the baseline and isn’t shy about mixing it up inside. He suited up for Repeza at Unicaja for the two years Repesa was away from Croatian basketball and was one of the major catalysts in Malaga’s playoff run last season.
The young Bogdanovic (a 6’8” small forward) is the player that might just inflict the most damage due to his unpredictability. He’s the only one on the squad that has actual NBA experience having suited up for the Minnesota Timberwolves in the 2011-12 season. After stints in the NBA and in Spain (where I actually got to cover some of his games) he returned to the Croatian pro circuit and is hailed as among the best cagers in the country.
However, his temperament did not blend well when Repeza returned to coach the national team and in 2012, Bogdanovic was kicked out of the team due to alleged “chemistry issues”. But in 2013, he and Repeza decided to bury the hatchet and he turned out to be Eurobasket’s third leading scorer, averaging 17.7 PPG (behind Bosnia and Herzegovina’s Mirza Teletovic and France’s Tony Parker—both legitimate NBA players).
He has a quick release jumpshot and is more adept at shooting off the dribble, which also makes him a serious assist threat (and a Teletovic clone). Bogdanovic has a tendency to hog the ball a lot and hence no player from Croatia made it to the top five in assists during last year’s Eurobasket. He’s the team’s volume shooter as Tomic and Zoric get most of their points from put backs off of his misses. So if Croatia has a marked man, Bogdanovic is it.
There’s also Krunoslav Simon, a 6’6” two-guard who basically shoots a lot of threes but brings a lot of defense against the opposing shooters and penetrators. He’s not ashamed to take a charge and collected quite a few of them when he played last season for Unicaja Malaga—yes, under Repeza.
THE ANALYSIS:
Firstly, Draper has a tendency of getting into foul trouble guarding quicker and smaller guards. He was among the top five in steals during last year’s Eurobasket (1.1 SPG) because he was getting thefts from bigger and slower opposition. Watching him in ACB Liga Endesa (there was a time when Sergio Llull missed a stretch of games and he became Sergio Rodriguez’s chief back-up) , he picked up quick and cheap fouls ball hawking against Caja Laboral’s Thomas Heurtel and Unicaja Malaga’s Jayson Granger; two small guards who have a lot of quickness.
Against the quickness of Jayson Castro, LA Tenorio or even Jimmy Alapag, Draper may be strapped with fouls and Repeza will be forced to use the slower Ukic more, which could lead to a number of thefts by the Gilas backcourt leading to unmolested fastbreaks.
Secondly, Tomic also has a penchant for using his hands on defense more than necessary. Despite starting for FC Barcelona (and even before in his days with RMB), Tomic gets into early foul trouble and his squad has to go to a “center by committee” strategy. He usually has an issue with bigs who out-position and out-jump him. Tomic isn't that wide (he's quite skinny) and needs his appendage advantage to get the job done. Marcus Douthit (assuming he'll still be around) is excellent at sealing off would-be rebounders because of his knack for getting into position quickly. Japeth Aguilar can out jump some of the European bigs—Tomic may be one of them. This combination of innate talents that the Gilas frontline possesses may just cause enough damage for Tomic to be cancelled out of the equation by sitting on the bench during the match strapped with fouls.
Zoric (who sometimes subs for Tomic, although I've seen them on the court together on occasion) is a minutes monster, though. He hardly gets into foul trouble and is crafty enough to work around box outs. But if Tomic’s length is eliminated, Gilas will now only have to concentrate on Zoric and the back-ups to battle for the boards. Difficult but plausible.
As for Bogdanovic, the unenviable task of being his shadow will have to fall on Gabe Norwood.
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Can Gabe Norwood lockdown Bojan Bogdanovic like he did Jarvis Hayes?
Qatar reinforcement Jarvis Hayes (6’7”) told me after the Philippines won against his squad—and he was limited to a tournament low thirteen points—that had never been played that way since he was in college, which was the ultimate tribute to Norwood’s stifling defense. Also remember that Bogdanovic has a short fuse and could become emotional if he is not given space to create his shot. Norwood is the best small forward defender on the team—unless coach Chot adds someone like Arwind Santos or a pesky Calvin Abueva on the squad. Others can pick up Norwood’s offense, but his lockdown abilities will be much needed if Gilas intends to pull off an opening day upset.
Croatia will be Gilas’ gauge on how to proceed in the prelims. And while the speed and quickness edge may belong to the Filipinos—perhaps even against all their groupmates—you’ll still need to get the ball to execute the offense and the rebounding edge definitely belongs to the Croats, unless the Filipinos pilfer a lot to compensate.
Gilas will need to play their “A” game against Croatia, and we’re only on the Philippines’ first game.