NBA Junior World Championship (August 2018)

[JGX]

NBA, USA Basketball, and Disney are organizing a U14 World Championship, sort of similar to the Little League World Series with 8 American teams and 8 international teams:

https://jrnbawc.nba.com/index.html

This is presumably intended for club teams, but there doesn't really seem to be any restriction on what type of team you can have as long as the players are the right age.

[Dtown]

Might be interesting, I imagine there should be television interest with Disney involved. Wondering how they will narrow the teams down.

[JGX]

Canada regional tournament info:

http://www.basketball.ca/en/news-article/nba-and-canada-basketball-to-host-regional-tournament-for-the-jr

[JGX]

Australian representatives:

http://www.smh.com.au/sport/basketball/tears-of-joy-as-eltham-wildcats-bulleen-boomers-kids-chosen-for-jr-nba-world-championships-in-usa-20180131-h0rksf.html

[JGX]

There is more qualification info on the tournament website. Sounds like the Africa/Middle East, Europe, Mexico, and South American representatives will be some kind of multinational selection instead of the winners of a regional tournament, that could make things rather unbalanced.

[rubenhamilton]

Date of starting the batches of basketball?

[eugenebuchanan]

NBA - Junior world championship info.

[JGX]

Some interesting spam in the previous posts.

Indian representatives will be Bengaluru girls and Delhi boys:

https://www.firstpost.com/sports/youth-teams-from-bengaluru-delhi-to-represent-india-at-junior-nba-world-championship-in-orlando-4454775.html

[JGX]

Qualifiers have been decided for the Canadian championship, which will be held in St. Catharines at the same time as the FIBA Americas U18 tournament:

Boys
Brampton Breakdown (Ontario)
Community Y Panthers (Nova Scotia)
Tornades de Longueil (Quebec)
Regina Sonics (Saskatchewan)
AthElite (British Columbia)

Girls
Welland Warriors (Ontario)
Valley Jr. Axewomen (Nova Scotia)
Seminaire Saint-Francois Blizzard (Quebec)
Saskatoon Shock (Saskatchewan)
VK Basketball (British Columbia)

Here is the Manitoba-Saskatchewan qualifier, in case you really want to watch U14 club basketball:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLE2Q9hz09k

All the US regional qualifiers will be streamed on FloHoops.

[JGX]

Rosters for all the tournament teams are here:

https://ak-static.cms.nba.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/94/2018/07/Domestic_Interational_JRNBAWC_Rosters_A.pdf

The actual names of the clubs representing the US regions:

Boys
Northwest--Seattle Rotary
West--Elite SC
Central--Drive5 Power Elite 2022
South--Team FOE
Midwest--The Family
Southeast--TSF Mack 2022
Mid-Atlantic--Slam City
Northeast--6th Boro Hoops

Girls
Northwest--Tree of Hope Pacific Red
West--California Storm
Central--KC Prodigy
South--Lady Nike Pro Skills
Midwest--Sky Digg Soldiers
Southeast--SC 76ers
Mid-Atlantic--Germantown Lady Panthers
Northeast--Empire State Basketball Club

[JGX]

Day 1 scores. These are 32-minute games with a running clock if the margin is above 30 points in the second half. Some of these games in the international bracket could have been much worse.

International Boys
Africa/Middle East 74 China 44
Canada 69 Mexico 20 (43-0 at halftime)
Canada 85 China 68

Europe 75 India 34
Australia 80 India 43
South America 44 Europe 39 (this was on FS1 and it was an epic brickfest...Europe 5/36 from three and 4/15 from the line)

US Boys
South 67 Northwest 37
Mid-Atlantic 68 Northwest 38
Mid-Atlantic 77 Midwest 61

Central 87 Northeast 55
West 72 Southeast 68
Northeast 72 West 69 (tough turnaround for a West team with only seven players)

International Girls
Australia 57 India 11
Australia 58 South America 16
Europe 75 India 28

Canada 63 Mexico 20
China 63 Africa/Middle East 39
Canada 65 China 44

US Girls
Midwest 63 Northwest 54
Midwest 74 South 70
Mid-Atlantic 59 Northwest 50

West 52 Southeast 50
Southeast 65 Central 56
West 54 Northeast 46

[JGX]

Second day of pool play:

International Boys
Africa/Middle East 97 Mexico 23
China 78 Mexico 14
Africa/Middle East 82 Canada 44

Australia 64 South America 39
South America 59 India 46
Europe 58 Australia 46

US Boys
Mid-Atlantic 64 South 50
Northwest 75 Midwest 68
Midwest 55 South 53

Central 77 West 63
Southeast 58 Northeast 56
Central 67 Southeast 65

International Girls
Europe 85 South America 20
Europe 50 Australia 49
India 40 South America 37

Canada 72 Africa/Middle East 63
China 43 Mexico 10
Africa/Middle East 62 Mexico 25

US Girls
South 43 Mid-Atlantic 38
Mid-Atlantic 62 Midwest 41
South 54 Northwest 41

Southeast 50 Northeast 30
Central 58 West 54
Central 60 Northeast 42

Day off tomorrow, then knockout play begins on Friday. The African boys team is going to be tough to beat--I'm sure aspersions are already being cast over the ages of a couple of their players...

[JGX]

Bracket Quarterfinals:

International Boys
Africa/Middle East 86 India 29
Europe 67 China 50
Australia 77 Mexico 17
Canada 62 South America 54

US Boys
Southeast 71 Mid-Atlantic 59
Northeast 50 Midwest 48
Central 73 Northwest 51
South 83 West 63

International Girls
Canada 56 South America 10
Australia 65 Africa/Middle East 24
Europe 65 Mexico 14
China 62 India 31

US Girls
Southeast 66 Northwest 56
Central 61 South 59
Mid-Atlantic 52 Northeast 35
Midwest 53 West 49

Upset of the day goes to the Southeast boys who knocked off the unbeaten Mid-Atlantic team despite playing without several starters.

[JGX]

Bracket semifinals and final. Eliminated teams play a "positive finish" game against an eliminated team from the other bracket:

International Boys
Africa/Middle East 69 Europe 27
Canada 63 Australia 52
Africa/Middle East 93 Canada 75

US Boys
Southeast 73 Northeast 55
Central 54 South 51
Central 69 Southeast 53

Positive Finish Boys
Mid-Atlantic 74 China 53
Northwest 74 Mexico 28
West 91 India 33
Midwest 56 South America 43
South 66 Europe 34
Northeast 57 Australia 46

International Girls
Australia 52 Canada 44
Europe 63 China 48
Europe 45 Australia 42

US Girls
Central 71 Southeast 68
Mid-Atlantic 63 Midwest 51
Central 45 Mid-Atlantic 41

Positive Finish Girls
West 77 Africa/Middle East 47
South 86 India 16
Northwest 75 South America 13
Northeast 53 Mexico 13
Southeast 70 China 56
Midwest 71 Canada 38

The Central girls came back from a 60-48 deficit after three quarters against Southeast in the semifinals, and then scored the last nine points of the game to edge Mid-Atlantic in the final. Central boys had a comeback of their own in the semis, outscoring South 20-8 in the fourth quarter. Both Central teams are from the Kansas City area, who knew that was the capital of youth basketball in the US now?

Canada gave it a better shot against Africa/Middle East this time around. Interested to see how the boys championship game goes. The Americans are probably favorites in the girls game.

[JGX]

Central Boys (Drive5 Power Elite) won a hard-fought championship game with Africa/Middle East, 60-50. Central had a small lead throughout the game but couldn't put it away until the final minutes, when the African team's lack of depth haunted them as three starters fouled out.

Central Girls (KC Prodigy) beat Europe 68-38 in the girls championship. Europe's point guard was apparently injured earlier in the tournament and they had a lot of trouble with the ball pressure of the Americans.

NBA definitely put a lot into this event, bringing everyone to Orlando for 10 days, getting a bunch of games nationally televised, lots of current and former NBA and WNBA players hanging out in Orlando, and Adam Silver presenting the trophies to the winners. It'll be interesting to see how this develops in the future.