Seven Olympic slots staked in World Cup

MANILA, Philippines — Seven of 12 slots available for men’s basketball in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics will be awarded at the end of the FIBA World Cup in China on Aug. 31-Sept. 15 with the remaining five tickets to be allocated to Japan as host country and the winners of four qualifying tournaments.

The Philippines is one of 32 countries competing in the coming World Cup. It’s the largest assembly of nations ever in World Cup history. The inaugural World Cup was held in Argentina in 1950 and the 18th edition marks the third competition in Asia after the Philippines in 1978 and Japan in 2006. China won a 14-7 vote over the Philippines in the FIBA Central Board for the right to stage the conclave this year. The Philippines will co-host the 2023 tournament with Japan and Indonesia but the semifinals and final will be held in Manila.

The highest finish of an Asian country in the World Cup was third by the Philippines in Rio de Janeiro in 1954. No other Asian nation has come close to a podium finish. 

For this year’s World Cup, 85 countries participated in the qualifiers, including five that were eliminated in the European pre-qualifiers. In the six windows, the competing cast listed 16 countries from Africa, 16 from Asia/Oceania, 32 from Europe (including eight that survived the pre-qualifiers) and 16 from the Americas. Making their World Cup debut will be the Czech Republic and Montenegro while five former champions are shooting for another title. The ex-titlists are Spain (2006), the US (1954, 1986, 1994, 2010, 2014), Argentina (1950), Brazil (1959, 1963) and Serbia (1998, 2002).

The 32 qualifiers are Angola, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Senegal and Tunisia from Africa; Argentina, Brazil, Canada, the US, Venezuela, Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico from the Americas; the Czech Republic, Italy, Serbia, France, Lithuania, Spain, Germany, Poland, Turkey, Greece, Russia and Montenegro from Europe and Australia, New Zealand, Japan, South Korea, Iran, Jordan, Philippines and host China from Asia/Oceania.

A draw will be conducted by FIBA in Shenzhen on March 16 to determine the composition of eight four-team groups in the first round of eliminations. NBA legend Kobe Bryant and recording artist Jason Derulo, born in Florida to Haitian parents, will co-host the event. The eight groups will play their round-robin games in eight different venues – the 18,000-seat Cadillac Arena in Beijing, the 20,000-seat Nanjing Youth Olympic Sports Park Gymnasium in Nanjing, the 18,000-seat Mercedes Benz Arena in Shanghai, the 13,000-seat Wuhan Gymnasium in Wuhan, the 18,000-seat Dongfeng Nissan Cultural and Sports Center in Dongguan, the 14,700-seat Foshan International Sports and Cultural Center in Foshan, the 18,000-seat Guangzhou International Sports Arena in Guangzhou and the 18,000-seat Shenzhen Universiade Sports Center in Shenzhen.

After the first round, the top two teams from each group advance to the second round where the 16 survivors are split into four groups of four for a round-robin. Then, the top two finishers of each group move on to the eight-team knockout quarterfinals on Sept. 10 and 11. The four survivors then square off in the semifinals on Sept. 13 and the final will be held in Beijing on Sept. 15. A total of 92 contests will be staged over 16 days.

The top African finisher, the top two Americas finishers, the top two European finishers, the top Oceania finisher and the top Asian finisher will claim outright tickets to the 2020 Olympics. The luck of the draw will play a role in determining how far certain countries will go in the race for Olympic slots among contenders in their zones.

Two countries in FIBA’s top 10 rankings failed to qualify for the World Cup – No. 7 Slovenia and No. 9 Croatia. NBA players from Slovenia are Miami’s Goran Dragic and Dallas’ Luka Doncic. Cameroon, whose leading scorer is former two-time UAAP MVP Ben Mbala, narrowly missed the cut, losing the last African ticket to the Ivory Coast via the quotient system. Ivory Coast finished the qualifiers with a plus factor of 86 compared to Cameroon’s 78. Other countries that won’t go to China include No. 14 Mexico, No. 15 Latvia and No. 19 Ukraine.