India’s U16 Boys’ Basketball team for 2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship in Vietnam

The Basketball Federation of India (BFI) has announced the 12-member squad of youth players who will represent the country at the 2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship in Nha Trang City, Vietnam, from October 18-28th, 2011.

India, who qualified for this championship after defeating Nepal and Sri Lanka in qualifiers in New Delhi in August, have been slotted in Group A of the FIBA Asia U16 Championship along with reigning champions China, Malaysia, and Chinese Taipei.

India’s squad will be highlighted by young star players such as Punjab’s Loveneet Singh and Chhattisgarh’s Ajay Pratap Singh. Additionally, Punjab’s 15-year-old 7-foot-2-inch player Satnam Singh Bhamara, who was part of India’s Senior Men’s team at the FIBA Asia Championship in China last month, will also be part of the U16 side. India’s coaching contingent will be led by head coach Jai Prakash Singh.

India’s U16 Boys Basketball Team for 2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship

Abhishek Rai

Khusmeet Singh Atwal

Karthickeyan Saminathan

Rakesh Singh Sangwan

Loveneet Singh

Sanjeev Kumar

Narender Satyawan

Syed Anam Ali

Akimjeet Singh Sohal

Pankaj Rathee

Ajay Pratap Singh

Satnam Singh Bhamara

Head Coach: Jai Prakash Singh

Coach: JN Nehra

Coach: Divya Singh

Physiotherapist: Nilesh Shah

FIBA Referee: Manoj Kotian

FIBA Referee: Zanim Mohd. Hashim

FIBA Commissioner: Naresh Aneja

India will tip off their campaign against holders China on Tuesday, October 18th. India will face Malaysia and Chinese Taipei on the 19th and 20th of October, respectively. The Second Round of the tournament will begin on Saturday, October 22nd. The Final is scheduled to be held on Friday, October 28th. The Indian Boys’ team is currently ranked 45th in the FIBA World Rankings.

Click here for Complete Preliminary Round Schedule.

2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship schedule of games

NHA TRANG CITY, Vietnam The schedule of games for the Preliminary Round of the 2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship has been announced. Defending champions China will take on SAARC qualifiers India, while 2009 FIBA Asia U16 Championship silver medalists Korea match wits with WABA U16 Champions Iraq on the opening day.

Hosts Vietnam will play their first ever FIBA Asia competition game against fellow SEABA team Indonesia; 2009 FIBA Asia U16 Championship Iran take on GCC team and debutants Qatar; Lebanon, who also will make their maiden appearance will take on another debutants Uzbekistan in other contests of the opening day, which will tip off with a game between Saudi Arabia and Japan.

Click here for Complete Preliminary Round Schedule.

India have been placed in Group A of the tournament, along with China, Malaysia, and Chinese Taipei.

India’s Schedule of Preliminary Round Games (Timings will be local)

Tuesday, October 18th – 2100: India vs. China

Wednesday, October 19th – 2100: India vs. Malaysia

Thursday, October 20th – India vs. Chinese Taipei

The Second Round of the tournament will begin on Saturday, October 22nd. The Final is scheduled to be held on Friday, October 28th.

FIBA Asia will run a special event website http://nhatrang2011.fibaasia.net during the event.

Draw completed for 2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship

Defending champions China were drawn with fellow East Asian team Chinese Taipei, Middle Asia’s India and SEABA’s Malaysia in Group A for the Preliminary Round of the 2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship to be held in Nha Trang City in Vietnam from Oct 18-28, 2011.

The draw was conducted at the Media Conference Room at the Wuhan Sports Center in Wuhan (China) on Sunday, the final day of the 26th FIBA Asia Championship.

Group B involves Korea, who lost to China in the final of the inaugural FIBA Asia U16 Championship at Johor Bahru (Malaysia) two years ago, along with two WABA teams Iraq and Lebanon and Uzbekistan.

Iran, the bronze medalists from Johor Bahru lead the fray in Group C also comprising Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Japan.

With only 15 teams in fray, Group D will see only three teams and all-SEABA affair – Philippines, Indonesia and Vietnam.

“It is a great significance that we are conducting this draw for the 2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship on the final day of the 26th FIBA Asia Championship,” said FIBA Asia president Sheikh Saud bin Ali Al-Thani who presided over the draw proceedings.

“The 26th FIBA Asia Championship will decide the champion team of FIBA Asia, while the 2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship will throw up the stars for the future,” he said.

FIBA Asia will run a special event website http://nhatrang2011.fibaasia.net during the event.

Groupings for the Preliminary Round

Group A: China, India, Malaysia, Chinese Taipei

Group B: Korea, Iraq, Uzbekistan, Lebanon

Group C: Iran, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Japan

Group D: Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam

India’s U16 side qualified for the championship after defeating Nepal and Sri Lanka in qualifiers in New Delhi in August

About 2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship

The 2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship is the qualifying event for the 2012 FIBA U17 World Championship to be played in Lithuania from July 17-26, 2012.

The top two teams from the 2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship will represent FIBA Asia at Lithuania.

System of Competition

The 16 teams are pooled into four groups of four teams each for the Preliminary Round.

The top three teams from each group will advance to the Second Round, and will be drawn into two groups of six teams each.

In the Second Round, each team will carry forward the results against the other qualifying teams in their Preliminary Round group and will play against teams qualifying from the other Preliminary Round group. The top four teams from each Second Round will qualify for the Quarterfinals, from which stage it will be a knockout.

India U16s qualify for U16 FIBA Asia Championship

93 points per game. That was the average margin of victory for India's U16 Boys basketball team, as they faced U16 teams from Nepal and Sri Lanka on August 2-3, at the Indira Gandhi Stadium in New Delhi. The purpose of this slaughter? The three teams were brought together to fight for a spot at the 2nd U16 FIBA Asia Championship, which will be held at Nha Trang City in Vietnam from October 18-28th. India's qualification was never in question, but the full destructive force by which the young stars went about their business was remarkable, indeed.

Here is a complete dissection.

India prepared the best possible team for this competition: The U16 probables had already been in camp in Delhi, preparing for the qualifiers and for the FIBA Asia event later this year, for one and a half months. What this side truly boasted of was experience: in players such as Chhattisgarh's Ajay Pratap Singh, Punjab's Kushmeet Singh and Love Neet Singh, MP's Syed Anam Ali, and Delhi's Narender, India had players who had been superstars in their own right of their age level. Added to this group were two players who are currently on scholarship at the IMG Academy in the USA: Chhattisgarh's guard Sanjeev Kumar, and the biggest name of them all, Punjab's 7-foot-1, 15-year-old giant, Satnam Singh Bhamara.

So when this group, along with several others, took the court to play our hapless neighbours, the results were expectedly lopsided. India defeated Nepal by 98 points in the first game, running and gunning behind seven players who scored in double digits. Ajay Pratap Singh and Love Neet Singh led the scoring with 19 and 18 points respectively. One of the true eye-popping numbers in this game was the score at the end of three quarters: 100-20. The final score, no less impressive: 134-36.

Leading the players from the sidelines were Delhi-based coaches JP Singh, J Nehra, and former Indian Women's superstar Divya Singh. I overheard something interesting from one of the probables that didn't make the squad about Coach Singh: "He said that 'When you're in my team, I have no feeders, no forwards, and no pivot players. You must be ready to play whatever position I ask you to play'." And true to this, most of the players, except for perhaps the bigs Satnam and Rakesh Sangwan, played as fluidly as they possibly could.

In the final against Sri Lanka on Wednesday, India fielded a big starting lineup, where our small forward, Ajay, was perhaps as tall as our opponent's Center (6'4"). On PF was 6'6" Sangwan, and Satnam held on to the Center position.

This was the kind of game that would have basketball scouts salivating on Satnam's potential. Let me make a note here that this was the first time really that I was watching Satnam play competitively against guys of his own age group. Despite the fact that he has represented Punjab at the U18 and India at the Senior level over the past month, he is still only a 15-year-old, and qualified to play for the U16 level, too. After a relatively easy first game (13 points, 3-4 blocks), Satnam EXPLODED against Sri Lanka. His teammates did a good job in getting him the ball, and he rewarded them with aggressive inside offense. Satnam was near-automatic against the hapless defenders once he got the ball inside. In roughly 26 minutes of action, he scored 28 points (barely missing any shots), brought down 8 rebounds, and got three highlight-reel blocks.

The rest of the team, meanwhile, continued dominating like they did a day before. The smaller players like Narender, Kushmeet, and Love Neet were too fast for Sri Lanka, as they caused dozens of turnovers with their full-court press, and on the other end, scored with ease on tireless fast-breaks. India cruised to an 88 point victory in the final, 122-34.

Entry into the U16 FIBA Asia Championship secure, this team now has a lot more time before October to continue improving. If they can keep this core together and motivated, they may well spring a surprise or two against Asia's powerhouses. And even if they don't yet, their play over these two games, albeit against weak competition, has proved that Indian basketball fans can rest assured: the future of the game is bright, indeed!

Here are the scores from the two games:

India vs. Nepal: India (Ajay Pratap Singh 19, Love Neet Singh 18, Satnam Singh Bhamara 13, Akash Bhasin 11, Kushmeet Singh 10, S. Karthickeyan 10, Rakesh Sangwan 10) bt. Nepal 134-36 (33-9, 31-4, 36-7, 34-16).

India vs. Sri Lanka: India (Satnam Singh Bhamara 28, Kushmeet Singh 26, Love Neet Singh 12, Ajay Pratap Singh 11) bt. Sri Lanka (Kenneth W 12, Praveen Ganlath 10) 122-34 (35-11, 29-8, 35-11, 23-4).

India Youth Boys to face Nepal & Sri Lanka in Delhi

The Indian Youth (U16) Boys basketball squad will face youth teams from Nepal and Sri Lanka at the KD Jadhav Indoor Hall of the Indira Gandhi Stadium in New Delhi from August 1-3, 2011. These games will decide on the team which will qualify for the 2nd FIBA Asia Championship for Youth Boys at Nha Trang City in Vietnam, from October 18-28th.

The 12-member squad to participate in this team was announced on Friday, July 29, 2011:

Akash Bhasin (Chhattisgarh)

Ajay Pratap Singh (Chhattisgarh)

Sanjeev Kumar (IMG Academy / Chattisgarh)

Narender (Delhi)

Akimjeet Singh Sohal (Delhi)

Pradeep Kumar (Delhi)

Rakesh Sangwan (Haryana)

Syed Anam Ali (Madhya Pradesh)

Kushmeet Singh (Punjab)

Love Neet Singh (Punjab)

Satnam Singh Bhamara (IMG Academy / Punjab)

S. Karthickeyan (Tamil Nadu)

Coach: JP Singh

Coach: J Nehra

Assistant Coach: Divya Singh

Physiotherapist Neelesh Shah

Amongst the young stars highlighting this squad are the likes of Satnam Singh Bhamara, the 7-foot-1 Center who has already represented India's Senior squad. Chhattisgarh's electrifying superstar Ajay Pratap Singh will be a major force in this team, as he is one of the most talented and confident young players in Indian basketball today. Three players from the Delhi team which won the Youth Nationals in Nagpur earlier this year - Narender, Akimjeet Singh Sohal, and Pradeep Kumar - will also star in this side.

Indian Youth Probables (Boys & Girls) called for coaching camp in New Delhi

32 Boys and 31 Girls of the Indian Youth (under-16) division have been called up for a coaching camp to be held at the KD Jadhav Indoor Hall in New Delhi from June 15th – July 29th. A selection committee of the Basketball Federation of India (BFI) have selected these probables based on their performance at the 28th Youth National Basketball Championship for Boys & Girls in Nagpur from May 26th-June 2, 2011.

The camp in Delhi will determine India’s Youth National teams for FIBA Asia U16 Championships later in the year. The Indian U16 Boys side will get an opportunity to qualify for the 2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship for Boys in Nha Trang City (Vietnam) from October 18-28, 2011. The Indian U16 Girls side will participate in the 2nd FIBA Asia U16 Championship for Girls in Urumqui (China) from October 5-12, 2011.

In addition to the players selected from the Youth Nationals, the eight Indian youngsters currently getting training at the IMG-Academy in Bradenton, Florida (USA) have also been invited to the camp in New Delhi.

Youth Probables

Boys

Om Jaiswal (Chhattisgarh)
Akash Bhasin (Chhattisgarh)
P. Murli (Chhattisgarh)
Ajay Pratap Singh (Chhattisgarh)
Dinesh Mishra (IMG Academy / Chhattisgarh)
Sanjeev Kumar (IMG Academy / Chhattisgarh)
Lawkesh Sharma (Chhattisgarh)
Narender (Delhi)
Akimjeet Singh Sohal (Delhi)
Pradeep Kumar (Delhi)
Panjak Rathee (Delhi)
Gaurav Ohlyan (Delhi)
Rohan Pethani (Gujarat)
Rajesh Sangwan (Haryana)
Himanshu Sharma (Haryana)
Vivek Sandhu (Haryana)
Shubham Mishra (Madhya Pradesh)
Syed Anam Ali (Madhya Pradesh)
Gopal Singh Rathee (Madhya Pradesh)
Ashiv Jain (IMG Academy / Madhya Pradesh)
Jagtap Rohan Ramesh (Maharashtra)
Shaikh Ibrahim Riyaz (Maharashtra)
Malik Saleem Mohd. Ibrahim (Maharashtra)
Kushmeet Singh (Punjab)
Loveneet Singh (Punjab)
Satnam Singh Bhamara (IMG Academy / Punjab)
Akashdeep Hazra (Punjab)
Navjot Singh (Rajasthan)
S. Karthickeyan (Tamil Nadu)
Himanshu Singh (Uttar Pradesh)
Abhishek Rai (Uttar Pradesh)
Sagar Joshi (West Bengal)

Girls

Sangeeta Das (Chhattisgarh)
Anjana Daisy Ekka (Chhattisgarh)
Poonam Chaturvedi (Chhattisgarh)
Pooja Ambishta (IMG Academy / Chhattisgarh)
A. Kavita (IMG Academy / Chhattisgarh)
Sangeetha Kaur (Chhattisgarh)
Sharanjeet Kaur (Chhattisgarh)
Soumya Babbar (IMG Academy / Delhi)
Rimpy Hooda (Haryana)
Anju Bhalotlia (Haryana)
Bharti Sihag (Haryana)
Komal Yadav (Haryana)
Praneetha S (Karnataka)
Karishma Rajan (Karnataka)
Prami P. Lal (Kerala)
Elizabeth Hilarious (Kerala)
Anathy Vimal (Kerala)
Poojamol KS (Kerala)
Ashwathy S. Thampi (Kerala)
Monika Gurjar (Madhya Pradesh)
Sruthi Menon (Maharashtra)
Ishwari Pingle (Maharashtra)
Krithika Divadkar (Maharashtra)
Shireen Limaye (Maharashtra)
Nirmal Kaur (Punjab)
Kulwinder Kaur (Punjab)
K. Devi Rajalaksmi (Tamil Nadu)
R. Sharmila (Tamil Nadu)
Shruti (Uttar Pradesh)
Barkha Sonkar (IMG Academy / Uttar Pradesh)
Madhu Kumari (West Bengal)

Definitely some interesting young players on the list - several of them have been in the fray for a while now, and a few made their mark at the Nagpur Youth Nationals recently.

First off, these are the kids who are at the IMG Academy in the USA, and will definitely be playing at the highest level because of their training and competition level - Boys: Satnam Singh Bhamara, Sanjeev Kumar, Dinesh Mishra, and Ashiv Jain. Girls: Barkha Sonkar, Pooja Ambishta, Soumya Babbar, and A. Kavita. These eight kids have been studying and playing there for almost a year now. The standout name amongst them is obviously of 7 foot 1 youngster Satnam Singh Bhamara, who, with his combination of size, skill, and youth, has become the Big Indian Basketball Hope.

Amongst the girls, the other star youngster is Maharashtra's Shireen Limaye, who is also the youngest player to be called up for India's Sr. Women's camp. Highly experienced at her age, Shireen will be one of the superstars of India's U16 Girls' squad.

Other players who had impressive outings at the Nagpur Youth Nationals are Kerala's Poojamal, who scored 40 points to go with 13 rebounds to lead her team to a gold medal win in the Girls' final, Chhattisgarh's Anjana Ekka, Maharashtra's Sruthi Menon, and Haryana's Rimpy Hooda.

One of the most interesting names in the girls' probables is of Poonam Chaturvedi, who at 6 foot 6 inches, is India's tallest female basketball player, and is still almost a month short of her 16th birthday. Originally from UP, Chaturvedi played for Chhattisgarh at the Youth Nationals, and despite her inexperience, was a major force in helping her team bag the silver medal.

In the Boys' list, there are several players from the gold winners Delhi, including Akimjeet Singh Sohal, Narendar, and Pradeep Kumar. Runners-up MP are represented by 3 players, including Syed Anam Ali and sharpshooter Shubham Mishra. Punjab's high-scoring 'Singh duo' of Loveneet and Kushmeet will also be attending. Other impressive performers were Akash Bhasin (Chhattisgarh), Saleem Ibrahim (Maharashtra), and Rakesh Sangwan (Haryana).