Anticipation grows for men’s and women’s draw, Rio 2016 blog

The Carioca Arena 1 has held its Test Event and now the draw for the Olympic basketball tournament will take place on Friday with the anticipation growing by the minute.

The draw will take place at the House of Basketball, which are FIBA’s headquarters in Switzerland and can be watched live on youtube.com/FIBA at 15:30 local/CET time.

Hosts Brazil, reigning gold medallists, USA, Argentina, Australia, China, Lithuania, Nigeria, Spain and Venezuela are the nine men’s national teams that already have spots in the tournament field at the Summer Games.

The seven national sides with places in the women’s tournament are Brazil, the USA, Australia, Canada, Japan, Senegal and Serbia.

Men:

Women:

How the draw takes place?

Via FIBA press release:

The twelve (12) teams in each tournament will be divided into two (2) groups (A and B) of six (6) teams each. At the end of each draw, the groups should be of equal strength and there will be a strict separation of teams from a same region across the groups.

[…]

Official Draw for Women’s Olympic Basketball Tournament

Seven (7) teams have already qualified. They are:
Host: Brazil
World Champions: USA
Africa: Senegal
America: Canada
Asia: Japan
Europe: Serbia
Oceania: Australia

Five (5) more teams will qualify through the 2016 FIBA Women’s Olympic Qualifying Tournament (WOQT) taking place in Nantes, France from 13-19 June.

The 12 teams will be seeded as follows:
Pot 1: USA; Australia
Pot 2: Canada; Brazil
Pot 3: Senegal; Japan
Pot 4: Serbia; WOQT 1
Pot 5: WOQT 2; WOQT 3
Pot 6: WOQT 4; WOQT 5

The draw is completely open and without any limitations.

The teams qualified through the WOQT will be drawn into the Women’s Olympic Basketball Tournament’s five (5) vacant positions following the conclusion of the last game in Nantes on Sunday 19 June.

Official Draw for Olympic Basketball Tournament

Nine (9) teams have already qualified. They are:
Host: Brazil
World Champions: USA
Africa: Nigeria
Americas: Venezuela, Argentina
Asia: China
Europe: Spain, Lithuania
Oceania: Australia

Three (3) more teams will qualify through the 2016 FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournaments (OQTs) taking place in Belgrade (Serbia), Manila (Philippines) and Turin (Italy) from 4-10 July.

The 12 teams will be seeded as follows:
Pot 1: USA; Spain
Pot 2: Venezuela; Argentina
Pot 3: Nigeria; China
Pot 4: Australia; Brazil
Pot 5: Lithuania; OQT 1
Pot 6: OQT 2; OQT 3

The draw is open with the exception of the following limitation:
– Pot 4: In order to balance geographical principles and avoid having a group with three (3) teams from the Americas, Brazil will not be drawn into the group that has two (2) other teams from that region.

The teams qualified through the OQTs will be drawn into the Olympic Basketball Tournament’s three (3) vacant positions following the conclusion of the last game in Manila on Sunday 10 July.

BOOMERS ANNOUNCE STRONG POOL FOR SUMMER CAMP

Australia have named a strong 26-man squad for summer training camp as coach Andrej Lemanis begins his preparations for Rio 2016.

Amongst the players involved are the 12 players that featured in last year’s almost traditional Oceania title triumph over New Zealand, as are Louisiana State standout Ben Simmons and Utah Jazz guard Dante Exum, who is still recovering from an ACL tear that he suffered in Slovenia during last year’s preparations for the Oceania series against the Tall Blacks.

Lemanis though is still hopeful that Exum will be healthy enough make the squad that will play in Rio de Janeiro.

Also in the mix are veterans Joe Ingles and Aron Baynes after missing the games against New Zealand last summer. The two players last featured for the Aussies during the Round of 16 at the FIBA World Cup in Barcelona in 2014.

“It is a benefit to have a group that has spent time together both on and off the court,” said Lemanis. “That group went through a campaign together and a majority of that group also went to the world championships [World Cup] which will certainly help in our preparation.”

While Australia’s dominance in the Oceania sector of the basketball continent is highlighted by their usual Olympic birth, their supremacy will be coming to an end once the new FIBA calendar comes into play from 2017 as both Australia and New Zealand will join the FIBA Asia group.

CAMEROON CONFIDENT AHEAD OF WOMEN’S QUALIFYING ROUND

Former A&M Texas standout Achiri Ade did not get much playing time for Cameroon at Afrobasket Women, but hopes that she can give her nation the lift off needed to do the unthinkable and qualify for the Olympics at the Women’s Qualifying Tournament in France in June.

Ade averaged 2.6 points and 3.4 rebounds in 9.6 minutes per game as Cameroon finished runners-up of the African championship held in the Cameroonian capital city of Yaounde last October.

The home side reached the final with seven wins in as many games, but an 81-66 defeat to Senegal ended their hopes of claiming a first-ever continental trophy.

But while they could not claim the prize – they captured something else: national pride.

Cameroon now must defeat either Argentina or favourites Turkey in order to stand a chance of booking a ticket to Rio and Ade is upbeat in her own chances of being called up and of winning.

“I’m excited for the Cameroon national team,” she says. “Hopefully, I will be available to participate if I’m called up to play.

“I am doing well, and [am] just trying to stay in shape and be ready if I am called back.”