India to take part in FIBA 3x3 Youth World Championship in Italy from Friday

Groups, schedule of games, and other challenges that will take place in the 1st FIBA 3x3 Youth World Championship (YWC) for U18 Boys and Girls in Rimini Italy from September 9-11, 2011, have been announced by FIBA. India have been invited to send teams for both the boys’ and girls’ competitions, which are amongst the 60 total teams taking part in the tournament.

India’s Boys’ side have been placed in Group A, along with Tunisia, Greece, Estonia, Ukraine, Puerto Rico, Sri Lanka, South Korea, and Slovenia. The top four teams from the group will advance to the Quarter Final stage of the tournament.

India’s Girls’ side have been placed in Group C, along with Sri Lanka, Sweden, hosts Italy, USA, and Guam. Once again, the top four teams will advance to the Quarter Final stage of the tournament.

Here is the complete list of teams in their assigned groups:

Boys

Group A: Tunisia, India, Greece, Estonia, Ukraine, Puerto Rico, Sri Lanka, South Korea, Slovenia
Group B: Austria, Jordan, Serbia, Singapore, Syria, Spain, Qatar, Italy, Egypt
Group C: England, Japan, Canada, Romania, New Zealand, Turkey, Nepal, Latvia, Germany
Group D: Netherlands, Czech Republic, USA, South Africa, Bulgaria, Croatia, Guam, Russia, Denmark

Girls

Group A: Greece, Tunisia, Russia, Australia, Canada, England
Group B: Jordan, Angola, Czech Republic, Turkey, Spain, Netherlands
Group C: Sri Lanka, India, Sweden, Italy, USA, Guam
Group D: Germany, Austria, Japan, Ukraine, China, Syria

Here is India’s schedule of group games:

Boys

Sep 9, 12:00 PM: India vs. South Korea

Sep 9, 1:40 PM: India vs. Puerto Rico

Sep 9, 3:00 PM: India vs. Estonia

Sep 9, 5:40 PM: India vs. Slovenia

Sep 9, 6:20 PM: India vs. Sri Lanka

Sep 10, 12:00 PM: India vs. Ukraine

Sep 10, 1:20 PM: India vs. Greece

Sep 10, 3:30 PM: India vs. Tunisia

Girls

Sep 9, 1:00 PM: India vs. USA

Sep 9, 2:20 PM: India vs. Italy

Sep 9, 3:40 PM: India vs. Sweden

Sep 9, 5:00 PM: India vs. Guam

Sep 10, 1:00 PM: India vs. Sri Lanka

The knockout/classification matches will begin on the evening of Saturday, September 10th. Finals will be held after 6 PM on Sunday, September 11th.

FIBA 3x3 Rules: In this half-court basketball competition, each team will have four players – three starters plus one substitute. Each game will be 10 minutes long, with two halves of five minutes each. A one-minute overtime is held if the score is tied at the end of regulation. The shot-clock is 12 seconds, and the scoring limit is 21 points (that is, the first team to 21 wins). No time-outs are allowed: substitutions are to be made in dead-ball situations.

Outside of the 3x3 tournament, there will be many other tournaments taking place for the players to participate in, including a Free Throw Contest, Shootout Contest, Skills Challenge, and a Dunk Contest.

Here are India U18 basketball teams for the 1st FIBA 3x3 World Championship:

Boys

Kirti Goswami (Madhya Pradesh)

Love Neet Singh (Punjab)

Ajay Pratap Singh (Chhattisgarh)

Sivabalan Gnanasekaran (Tamil Nadu)

Coach: Kulwinder Singh Gill

Girls

Jeena PS (Kerala)

Aishwarya Natarajan (Tamil Nadu)

Amrutha Bhuskute (Maharashtra)

Shireen Limaye (Maharashtra)

Coach: Pete Gaudet

World Cup of Hoops tips off in Turkey

It has been a great summer for top global competitions in my two favourite sports. The excitement and stinging noise of vuvuzelas from the FIFA World Cup have barely stopped ringing in my ears, but now here's more to celebrate for hoop fans: the 2010 FIBA World Championships, featuring the best basketball teams in the world, tipped off in Istanbul, Turkey on August 28th.

The championships features 24 powerhouses of world basketball such as defending champions Spain (who won the tournament in Japan in 2006), 2006 silver medal winners Greece, a USA team full of young NBA stars, and Argentina. Other countries such as Serbia, Russia, Australia, Lithuania, and Brazil are also participating. Asia is featuring four teams too: China, Iran, Jordan, and Lebanon.

Spain and USA are probably joint favourites for this tournament, even though Spain is playing without the 2006 MVP and recent visitor to India Pau Gasol. Spain will be led by Juan Carlos Navarro, teenage phenom Ricky Rubio, Rudy Fernandez, and Marc Gasol.

The Americans have kept home their Beijing Olympics gold medal winning squad: So now Wade, Kobe, LeBron, Carmelo Anthony, Chris Bosh, etc, etc, etc... They have instead fielded a young, small team of quick guards, so small that Lamar Odom starts at Center. USA's best player is probably NBA scoring leader Kevin Durant. He will be supported by the likes of Derrick Rose, Andre Iguodala, and perhaps the team's only "elder" statesmen, Chauncey Billups.

The home squad of Turkey will also field an interesting lineup featuring NBA player Hedo Turkoglu and Ersan Ilyasova.

Other players to watch out for in this tournament will be Luis Scola (Argentina), Tiago Splitter and Leandro Barbosa (Brazil), Nicolas Batum (France), Goran Dragic (Slovenia), Dimitris Diamantidis (Greece), and Viktor Khryapa (Russia).

Unfortunately, this tournament has been marred by the injuries or omission of players who will not be able to show their skills at the world stage. After the aforementioned plethora of talented American stars and Spaniard Pau Gasol who will be skipping out, other well known names such as Manu Ginobili, Andres Nocioni (Argentina), Yao Ming (China), Dirk Nowitzki (Germany), Tony Parker (France), Nene (Brazil), and Andrew Bogut (Australia) won't be playing.

Still, the tournament has been able to gather a lot of hype and interest around the world, and could really be a propellent to help launch basketball even more as a global sport.

The competition tipped off last night with a shock, as an unfavoured French side took down defending champions Spain in their first game 72-66. USA took care of business against Croatia, defeating them easily 106-78. China's Yi Jianlian had an impressive start to the tournament with 26 points and 14 rebounds but couldn't stop his team from being put away by Greece 89-81.

On a side note, the Championships will be featuring three official ambassadors from India as part of the "Children of the World" programme. Two Indian sub-juniors Poojamal and Yogesh Kanderia, along with coach P. Deepa Sundari will be amongst hundreds of other youngsters from all FIBA nations to enjoy a short flavour of the championships and attend training camps.

Stay tuned for more info as basketball continues to take over the globe!

Four young hoopsters to represent India at Youth Olympic Games

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Held for the world's best athletes between the ages of 14-18, the first ever Youth Olympic Games (YOG) set to be held in Singapore are just around the corner now. The competition will take place from the 14th-26th of August, and the basketball tournament of this competition will be featuring a team of India.

The basketball tournament in the YOG will feature a 3-on-3, half-court format, and will include the participation of 20 countries from around the world. The Indian men's team has been drawn in a group with Serbia, Greece, Puerto Rico, and New Zealand.

After a tryout held at Ludhiana amongst nine probables from July 22-August 11, the BFI has announced that they will be sending four players (three starters and one substitute) to Singapore to represent India:

Shyam Sunder (Chhattisgarh)
Sukhjeet (Delhi)
Amit Kanarjee (Madhya Pradesh)
Kirti Goswami (Madhya Pradesh)

As noted above, this is a 3-on-3 half-court competition - each game will be 15 minutes long with three quick five minute periods. The first team to 33 or the team that is leading at the end of regulation time wins.

The schedule for India's games is:

15th August: India vs. Puerto Rico
16th August: Serbia vs. India
18th August: India vs. Greece
19th August: New Zealand vs. India

Other countries taking part in the men's competition are Argentina, Iran, Lithuania, Panama, Egypt, Israel, Singapore, Turkey, USA, Central African Republic, Philippines, Spain, South Africa, US Virgin Islands, and Croatia.

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Indian Ballers to play at Singapore Youth Olympic Games

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A team from India will feature in the basketball tournament to be held at the first Youth Olympic Games (YOG), set to be held from August 14-26th in Singapore. The basketball tournament will be a 3-on-3 halfcourt competition, featuring teams from 20 countries around the world. The athletes will be the best basketball stars between the ages of 14-18. The YOG is the biggest gathering of athletes of 18 years and below, and will feature a total of 26 sports.

In the basketball tournament, the teams were drawn recently into four brackets, and the Indian men's squad have been drawn in a group with Serbia, Greece, Puerto Rico, and New Zealand. There is no Indian women's team. Click here to see the full draw.

India's group games are:

15th August: India vs. Puerto Rico
16th August: Serbia vs. India
18th August: India vs. Greece
19th August: New Zealand vs. India

The top two teams from each group will move on to knock-out quaterfinals, and the Final will be held on 23rd August. Harish Sharma, the secretary general of the Basketball Federation of India (BFI), confirmed that a short-list of eight players has been decided already, out of which four will be sent to Singapore for the competition.

Other countries taking part in the men's competition are Argentina, Iran, Lithuania, Panama, Egypt, Israel, Singapore, Turkey, USA, Central African Republic, Philippines, Spain, South Africa, US Virgin Islands, and Croatia.

As noted above, this is a 3-on-3 half-court competition - each game will be 15 minutes long with three quick five minute periods. The first team to 33 or the team that is leading at the end of regulation time wins.

I know that this 3-on-3 half court concept is being done to accomodate more teams and thus more games in a shorter span of time, but I still feel that it is really not the right way to go about promoting basketball. Anyone who has actually played basketball will testify how different this format is to an actualy full-court 5-on-5 game: players are not tested on their stamina and the games become more individual skill based than team-oriented. A different caliber of player will perform better in this situation as compared to REAL basketball.

Still, I think that the YOG are a great idea, and it's awesome that India will be representing a basketball team amongst countries featuring some of the best ballers in the world like USA, Spain, Greece, or Serbia.

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