Basketball at the 2008 Summer Olympics – Men's qualification

The men's qualification for Olympic basketball tournament occurred from 2006–2008; all five FIBA (International Basketball Federation) zones sent in teams.

The first qualifying tournament was the 2006 FIBA World Championship in which the champion was guaranteed of a place in the Olympics. Throughout the next two years, several regional tournaments served as qualification for the zonal tournaments, which doubles as intercontinental championships, to determine which teams will participate in the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Qualification

Outright qualification

A total of 12 teams will take part in the Olympics, with each NOC sending in one team. The host nation (the People's Republic of China) qualifies automatically as hosts.

There are a total of 5 zonal tournaments (doubling as intercontinental championships) that determined the qualifying teams, with a total of 7 teams qualifying outright. Each zone was allocated with the following qualifying berths:

Furthermore, the current world champion, Spain qualified automatically by winning at the 2006 FIBA World Championship.

Qualification via the wildcard tournament

The additional three teams will be determined at the FIBA World Olympic Qualifying Tournament 2008, with the best non-qualifying teams participating from teams that did not qualify outright. Each zone is allocated with the following berths:

Summary

Qualified for the Olympics outright
Qualified automatically
Qualified for the Wildcard Tournament

These are the final standings of the different Olympic qualifying tournaments. The venues are as follows, with the city of the knockout stage mentioned first:

Rank World Africa Americas Asia Europe Oceania Wildcard
1st  Spain  Angola  United States  Iran  Russia  Australia  Croatia
 Greece
Ranked 1st
2nd  Greece  Cameroon  Argentina  Lebanon  Spain  New Zealand
3rd  United States  Cape Verde  Puerto Rico  South Korea  Lithuania  Germany
4th  Argentina  Egypt  Brazil  Kazakhstan  Greece  Puerto Rico
5th  France  Nigeria  Canada  Jordan  Germany  New Zealand
 Brazil
 Slovenia
 Canada
Ranked 5th
6th  Turkey  Tunisia  Uruguay  Chinese Taipei  Croatia
7th  Lithuania  C.A.R.  Mexico  Qatar  Slovenia
8th  Germany  Ivory Coast  Venezuela  Japan  France
9th  Italy
 Angola
 Serbia and Montenegro
 Slovenia
 Australia
 Nigeria
 China
 New Zealand
Ranked 9th 		 Senegal  Panama  Philippines  Israel
 Italy
 Portugal
 Turkey
Ranked 9th 		 Lebanon
 Cape Verde
 South Korea
 Cameroon
Ranked 9th
10th  Morocco  U.S. Virgin Islands  China
11th  Mali  Syria
12th  Rwanda  Indonesia
13th  South Africa  Hong Kong  Czech Rep.
 Latvia
 Poland
 Serbia
Ranked 13th
14th  Mozambique  Kuwait
15th  DR Congo  India
16th  Liberia  UAE
17th =  Puerto Rico
 Lebanon
 Brazil
 Japan
21st =  Venezuela
 Senegal
 Panama
 Qatar

FIBA Africa

The FIBA Africa Championship 2007 at Angola determined FIBA Africa's only outright representative to the Olympics and two wildcard participants.

The tournament is structured into a preliminary round of 16 teams divided into 4 groups; the top two teams from each group advance to the knockout stages (quarterfinals, semifinals and final).

Angola won the tournament, beating Cameroon in the final, 86-72.[1] Cape Verde defeated Egypt by 2 points, 53-51 to join Cameroon in the wildcard tournament.[2]

FIBA Americas

The FIBA Americas Championship 2007 held in the Thomas & Mack Center at Las Vegas, Nevada determined the two teams representing FIBA Americas in the Olympics.

The tournament is structured into a preliminary round of ten teams divided into 2 groups; the bottom team from each group is eliminated in the quarterfinals, where results between groupmates carry over. The Top four teams advance to the semifinals. The fifth-best team in the quarterfinals qualifies for the Olympics.

Hosts United States dominated in the tournament, blowing out Argentinas B team, 118-81 in the final.[3] Puerto Rico and Brazil, the other semifinalists, and Canada the fifth-place team (tied for fourth at the quarterfinals but was beaten by Puerto Rico 72-66 in the last day of the quarterfinals to win the tiebreaker) qualify for the wildcard tournament.[2]

FIBA Asia

With China automatically qualified, a much weaker team (without Yao Ming and Wang Zhizhi) leaves the race wide open for FIBA Asia's Olympic berth. The tournament held in Tokushima, Japan is structured with a preliminary round of 16 teams divided into four groups, with the top two teams advancing to the quarterfinals, where they'll be divided into two groups. The top two teams in the quarterfinals groups advance to the knockout semifinals and finals.

China's early elimination in the preliminary round (their worst performance in the Asian Championships) simplified the implications: only the winner will advance outright to the Olympics. That winner was Iran which defeated Lebanon 74-69 in the final.[4] Korea escaped Kazakhstan 80-76 to join Lebanon in the wildcard tournament.[2]

FIBA Europe

Although Spain automatically qualified, they sent in their "A" team, considering EuroBasket 2007 was held in their homeland.

The tournament is divided into 5 rounds: the preliminary round where 16 teams are divided into 4 groups, the qualifying round, where bottom team from the prelims are eliminated, while the teams are reassigned into two 6-team groups, with results between teams that played already carried over, then the knockout stages (quarterfinals up to the final) where the top 4 teams in the qualifying round groups advance.

Spain survived into the final, where they were beaten by Russia, 60-59, which qualified outright to the Olympics.[5] The other outright berth was decided in the third-place game, where Lithuania beat Greece, 78-69. The wildcard qualifiers are Greece, Germany, Croatia and Slovenia, which defeated France in the 7th place game, 88-74, for the last wildcard berth.[2]

FIBA Oceania

With only Australia and New Zealand participating in the FIBA Oceania Championship 2007, FIBA Oceania's Olympic berth was decided in a best-of-three series played in Australia.

Australia won the first two games, rendering the third game inconsequential, which the Tall Blacks won. New Zealand qualified to the wildcard tournament.[6]

Qualified teams

After the end of wildcard tournament, the twelve teams that qualified for Beijing 2008 are:[2]

The italicized teams are the wildcards.

References

  1. ↑ SEN - Ndoye delivers post-mortem FIBA.com
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 PR N° 48 - Nine teams book their place for Beijing 2008 FIBA.com
  3. ↑ United States 118 vs. Argentina 81 FIBA.com
  4. ↑ IRN/LIB - It's Iraaaaaan! FIBA.com
  5. ↑ ESP/RUS - Kirilenko, Holden snatch gold for Russia FIBA.com
  6. ↑ AUS - Australia beat Tall Blacks again, reach Beijing FIBA.com
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