3X3 in Lithuania

[Hepcat]

It will be a very busy few days for Lithuanian 3x3 teams this coming weekend:

September 17-September 18

U23 Nations League Final - Bucharest

Not only will the Lithuanian Men's and Women's U23 teams be competing, but the Lithuanian Men's U21 team will be competing against the older fellows.

September 17-19

U17 Europe Cup - Lisbon

Both the Lithuanian Men's and Women's teams will be participating.

September 18-19

Prague Masters

A whopping three Lithuanian teams - Šakiai Gulbelė, Utena and Marijampolė Sūduva - will be participating.

September 19-20

Utrecht Challenger

Raudondvaris Tauras will be competing and representing Lithuanian 3x3 basketball.

[Hepcat]

September 17-September 18

U23 Nations League Final - Bucharest

Not only will the Lithuanian Men's and Women's U23 teams be competing, but the Lithuanian Men's U21 team will be competing against the older fellows.

So the Lithuanian Men's 3x3 team showed up undermanned for the U23 Nations League Final:

Teams - U23 Nations League Final

Ernestas Sederevičius was in Talinn with his Utena Juventus teammates where they lost 86-81 to Kalev in a qualifying final for the FIBA Champions League. Sederevičius didn't see any court time in Talinn either....

Game Scores - U23 Nations League Final

Lithuania 22 Poland 16
France 21 Lithuania 12
Lithuania 20 Israel 17

Lithuania nonetheless finished in first place in its group on the basis of a tie breaker with Israel.

Romania 20 Lithuania 9 (SF)

Lithuania's three man team couldn't cope with Romania in the semi. Although Romania qualified for the tournament only because Romania was hosting the event, the team is a big physical one which had previously given Lithuania fits in the six qualifying Stops. The three man Lithuanian team was no match for the Romanians in Bucharest that day.

Romania then lost the Final to Poland 21-17.

The U21 team prove overmatched and lost all its games including the opener to Egypt and a sound 21-4 thrashing at the hands of the Russian team.

The Women went 1-2 and failed to qualify for the semifinal.

So a very disappointing end to the U23 Tournament for Lithuania overall.

[Hepcat]

September 17-19

U17 Europe Cup - Lisbon

Both the Lithuanian Men's and Women's teams will be participating.

The Lithuanian Men's U17 team also showed up undermanned over the weekend with only three players:

Lithuanian Team - U17 Europe Cup

They lost both their games and didn't make the playoffs:

Game Scores - U17 Europe Cup

Germany 15 Lithuania 11
Portugal 14 Lithuania 12

[Hepcat]

September 18-19

Prague Masters

A whopping three Lithuanian teams - Šakiai Gulbelė, Utena and Marijampolė Sūduva - will be participating.

So three Lithuanian teams did participate.

Utena though showed up undermanned with just Ignas Labutis, Deividas Rasys and Ignas Razutis. Gintautas Matulis had been slated to join his 3x3 teammates in Prague but his Juventus team ended up playing a not previously scheduled game in Talinn on the evening of the 17th where they lost 86-81 to Kalev in a qualifying final for the FIBA Champions League. He therefore couldn't manage to make it to Prague for the tournament. Utena nonetheless put up a strong showing and upset Riga 20-18 in the QF before running out of gas and going down to eventual champion Jeddah 22-12 in the SF.

Šakiai Gulbelė had its regular lineup of Aurelijus Pukelis, Darius Tarvydas, Šarūnas Vingelis and Marijus Užupis who finally seems to be rounding back into form following his knee surgery last December. Gulbelė looked really good until losing 21-18 to Jeddah in the QF:

Šakiai Gulbelė keeps losing in the quarterfinals or semifinals in these international tournaments though and has as a result now slipped from third to sixth in the world team rankings.

The Marijampolė Sūduva team consisted of Evaldas Džiaugys, Tautvydas Kliučinykas, Justas Nausėdas and Kostas Jonuška who has now replaced previous regular team member Mintautas Bulanovas. They've all been playing for Sūduva in the NKL. The team had finished second to Šakiai Gulbelė in the Final Stop of the Lithuanian championships this past spring as well as winning the Alexela Talinn Open. I rate them as Lithuania's fourth best 3x3 team. Sūduva got to the quarterfinals in Prague but then lost a tight one to top rated Liman 21-19.

Game Scores - Prague Masters

Liman 21 Marijampolė 19 (QF)
Pirot 21 Antwerp 19 OT (QF)
Utena 20 Riga 18 (QF)
Jeddah 21 Šakiai 18 (QF)

Liman 21 Pirot 14 (SF)
Jeddah 22 Utena 12 (SF)

Jeddah 20 Liman 15 (F)

The real story of the tournament though was Jeddah. The team must have been created by Arab money interests. The Jeddah team trains in Serbia, is coached by a Slovenian and in Prague consisted of Frenchman Kevin Corre, Slovenian Dejan Mlakar, Serb Nemanja Draskovic and legendary Lithuanian 3x3 star Ovidijus Varanauskas who last played 3x3 for Pieno Žvaigždės in the 2020 Hoptrans tournament but hasn't played in an international competition for over five years. The play-by-play announcer was calling him "The Comeback Kid". Varanauskas scored 35 points over the five games second only to the 39 points scored by Nemanja Draskovic. He also drained the two pointer from beyond the arc that sank Šakiai Gulbelė in the last minute of their QF. Bad man!

Jeddah Wins Prague Masters

Were Ovidijus Varanauskas with Raudondvaris Tauras or Marijampolė Sūduva instead, these two teams would not only be competitive with the best in Lithuania but would be capable of challenging teams such as Liman, Riga, Ub and Amsterdam for the top spot in the world.

[Hepcat]

September 19-20

Utrecht Challenger

Raudondvaris Tauras will be competing and representing Lithuanian 3x3 basketball.

The Raudondvaris Tauras team was once again comprised of Šarūnas Beniušis, Paulius Semaška, Žygimantas Šimonis and Aurimas Urbonas.

Game Scores - Utrecht Challenger

Tauras looked rather good in its first two games but then bowed to eventual champions Amsterdam in the quarterfinals:

Ub 21 Piran 17 (QF)
Bielefeld 21 Girona 18 (QF)
Princeton 17 Lausanne 12 (QF)
Amsterdam 22 Raudondvaris 15 (QF)

Ub 21 Bielefeld 17 (SF)
Amsterdam 21 Princeton 11 (SF)

Amsterdam 17 Ub 13 (F)

[Hepcat]

Despite Lithuanian teams' nasty habit of falling just short of the top prize in recent tournaments, Lithuania is still second in FIBA's 3x3 Country ranking for Men behind only Serbia:

Country Ranking - Men

The Lithuanian U23 Men though have now leaped over Russia to first in the world rankings:

Country Ranking - U23 Men

Šakiai Gulbelė has now slipped from third to sixth in the team rankings but Utena has rocketed up to seventh from seventeenth:

Team Ranking

Raudondvaris Tauras has leaped up to #14 from #22 as well. And Marijampolė Mantinga has climbed a whopping 25 places to #23!

Darius Tarvydas is the highest ranked Lithuanian among the individual player rankings. He's #19 while teammates Aurelijus Pukelis and Šarūnas Vingelis are at #20 and #22 respectively.

Individual Ranking

What hurts Lithuania's country, team and player rankings is that with the exception of Ovidijus Varanauskas, none of the players are dedicated 3x3 ballers. They all have full time jobs from autumn to spring with NKL teams or Utena Juventus and are not therefore available to participate in all and every 3x3 tournament. As a result right now no Lithuanian teams are scheduled to participate in Abu Dhabi October 29-30th or Mexico City November 6-7th.

But if I had to assemble a Lithuanian 3x3 team today to train under Coach Dainius Novickas for some type of world championship at the end of the month, I'd pick these four players:

Aurelijus Pukelis - Center
Darius Tarvydas - Wing/Center
Ignas Vaitkus - Wing/PG
Ovidijus Varanauskas - PG

I'd have the luxury of a long list of alternates including Ignas Razutis(PG), Šarūnas Beniušis(C), Šarūnas Vingelis, Marijus Užupis, Vytautas Šulskis and Gintautas Matulis.

[Hepcat]

What hurts Lithuania's country, team and player rankings is that with the exception of Ovidijus Varanauskas, none of the players are dedicated 3x3 ballers. They all have full time jobs from autumn to spring with NKL teams or Utena Juventus and are not therefore available to participate in all and every 3x3 tournament. As a result right now no Lithuanian teams are scheduled to participate in Abu Dhabi October 29-30th or Mexico City November 6-7th.

But!!! Lithuania has nonetheless now climbed to #1 in the Combined ranking!

FIBA 3x3 Combined Country Ranking

The Hoptrans Tournament in July 2020 acted to spur the growth of 3x3 basketball in Lithuania. And the strides Lithuania has made internationally in the 3x3 game have been particularly dramatic since February when Dainius Novickas was made the overseer of Lithuania's national team programs.

[Hepcat]

So on Sunday the Lithuanian Men's 3x3 team not only succeeded in qualifying for the 2021 Europe Cup in Constanta, Romania but was accorded first place after these games:

Lithuania 21 Ireland 9
Lithuania 21 Romania 11
Lithuania 16 Georgia 15

Lithuania 21 Great Britain 11 (Qualifying Final)

And no, Georgia wasn't a particularly tough opponent. It's just that Team LT really sucked against Georgia as their shooting deserted them entirely. They were 0/13 from beyond the arc with Darius Tarvydas himself missing seven. Three or four of these were so wide open that the Lithuanian players had two or three seconds to aim carefully before letting the ball fly. Georgia shot 2/7 from beyond the arc. Moreover the refs were calling everything and there were free throws galore. Team LT was 2/11 from the charity stripe with the normally reliable Aurelijus Pukelis hitting only 1/6. It was so maddening that I was shouting at the computer screen. Georgia shot 6/11 from the free throw line. Team LT also missed a number of shots from down low that they had no problem draining in the other games. The exasperated looks of disgust on the faces of the Lithuanian players as they "congratulated" each other following their victory in this game told the story.

Here are the scoring totals for the Lithuanian players over the four games:

Aurelijus Pukelis - 31
Šarūnas Vingelis - 21
Darius Tarvydas - 20
Modestas Kumpys - 7

Aurelijus Pukelis has been the steadiest most reliable Lithuanian player of them all over these past few months. Here's a mix tape of Pukelis' play from that Qualifying Tournament on the June 26-27th weekend:

[Hepcat]

I was really impressed with Varanauskas. Probably best player in this tourney as for individual performance.... Maybe he lacks a vision and some other tactical and technical team play aspects, but when he goes one on one , he is pretty much unstoppable.

...add some Varanauskas who looks hell of the player in 3x3, and they could go to he Olympic qualifiers, succeed there and bring Olympic medal.

Here are some highlights from that 2020 Hoptrans tournament featuring Ovidijus Varanauskas playing for the Pieno Žvaigždės team:

[Hepcat]

Four of the top six rated 3x3 teams in the world including Šakiai Gulbelė competed in the Perm Bionord Quest International Tournament in Russia October 20-21st:

Teams - Perm Bionord Quest

But once again it was close but no cigar as Gulbelė got to the final but then lost to a very good Liman team:

Scores - Perm Bionord Quest

Inanomo 22 Bielefeld 20 (QF)
Gulbelė 21 Runa 13 (QF)
Liman 21 Graz 9 (QF)
Riga 21 Amsterdam 13 (QF)

Gulbelė 15 Inanomo 12 (SF)
Liman 20 Riga 19 (SF)

Riga 16 Inanomo 13 (Bronze)
Liman 21 Gulbelė 17 (F)

[Hepcat]

Lithuania is currently the top ranked country in the world in FIBA's 3x3 Combined category:

Combined Federation Rankings

Lithuania is currently ranked second in the world behind Serbia in the Men's 3x3 category:

Men's Rankings

Šakiai Gulbelė currently holds sixth spot in the world team rankings which is the best among Lithuanian teams:

Team Rankings

Šakiai has been decent so far this year with a sixth place finish at the Utsunomiya World Tour event on May 14th, a first at the Ulaanbaatar Challenger on May 21st and a fourth at the Novi Sad Challenger on June 3rd.

The 2022 3x3 World Cup is scheduled to take place in Antwerp July 21-26th. The Lithuanian men will be in a round-robin group with Chile, Germany, Mongolia and Taipei:

2022 World Cup Schedule

Mongolia and Germany could be tough.

Dainius Novickas continues as the Coach of the Lithuanian teams that will be competing at the World Cup. The list of candidates for the Men's team is as follows:

Gintautas Matulis - Vilnius Rivile
Aurelijus Pukelis - Šakiai Gulbelė
Ignas Razutis - Vilnius Rivile
Darius Tarvydas - Jeddah (Šakiai Gulbelė in 2021)
Marijus Užupis - Šakiai Gulbelė
Ignas Vaitkus - Vilnius Rivile

Vilnius Rivile played as Utena last year.

These players have just recently been dropped from the candidate list:

Paulius Beliavičius - Šakiai Gulbelė
Vytautas Šulskis - Vilnius Rivile
Ovidijus Varanauskas - Jeddah

A Team Lietuva consisting of Aurelijus Pukelis, Ignas Razutis, Darius Tarvydas and Šarūnas Vingelis finished second behind Serbia at the Europe Cup in September 2021. I suspect that the final roster of this World Cup 2022 team will consist of Aurelijus Pukelis(C), Darius Tarvydas(Wing/PG), Marijus Užupis(PG) and Ignas Vaitkus(Wing/C).

The candidates for the Women's team are Kamilė Nacickaitė, Gabrielė Šulskė, Martyna Petrėnaitė, Monika Grigalauskytė, Livija Sakevičiūtė and Eglė Zabotkaitė.

Sixteen year old Justė Jocytė is also training with the Lithuanian women but is ineligible to play in the World Cup tournament because she only just started competing in 3x3 events and has not therefore accumulated the rating points needed to be eligible. Jocytė is currently part of the U23 Women's team competing in the Nations' League Tournament in Kaunas this weekend. Both the Men's and Women's teams won all their games yesterday and today.

A Gold or Silver at the World Cup in Antwerp would do much to alleviate some of the disappointment I'm sure we all feel from the failures to qualify for the Olympics last summer.

[Hepcat]

I suspect that the final roster of this World Cup 2022 team will consist of Aurelijus Pukelis(C), Darius Tarvydas(Wing/PG), Marijus Užupis(PG) and Ignas Vaitkus(Wing/C).

So Coach Dainius Novickas announced the final composition of Team Lietuva today:

Gintautas Matulis
Darius Tarvydas
Marijus Užupis
Ignas Vaitkus

So with the two bookends beng dropped - Center Aurelijus Pukelis and PG Ignas Razutis - the team is essentially made up of four interchangeable players. Ironically Aurelijus Pukelis is FIBA's highest ranked Lithuanian player:

FIBA Player Rankings





Pukelis is a devastating weapon below the basket whenever his team has the ball. But Coach Novickas believes that 3x3 has now evolved to more of a speed game and that on defence Pukelis has trouble keeping fleeter wings from getting around him. We've of course been hearing a lot of that same mantra recently.

It will be interesting to see on Tuesday whether Užupis acts as the initiator of plays more often than the others and whether any of them spend much time in the low post as does Pukelis for Šakiai Gulbelė.



The Women's team will consist of Kamilė Nacickaitė, Martyna Petrėnaitė, Gabrielė Šulskė ir Monika Grigalauskytė all from the Kibirkšties club team of Vilnius.

[Hepcat]

Sixteen year old Justė Jocytė is also training with the Lithuanian women but is ineligible to play in the World Cup tournament because she only just started competing in 3x3 events and has not therefore accumulated the rating points needed to be eligible. Jocytė is currently part of the U23 Women's team competing in the Nations' League Tournament in Kaunas this weekend. Both the Men's and Women's teams won all their games yesterday and today.

Three stops of the FIBA 3x3 U23 Nations League Europe East division were held in Kaunas on successive days June 17-19th.

The Lithuanian Men's team consisted of Ernestas Jonkus, Rokas Mačiulis, Justinas Ramanauskas and Eimantas Žilius.

U23 Men Scores

STOP 1

Lithuania 17 Estonia 14
Lithuania 20 Ukraine 15
Lithuania 21 Latvia 6 (Gold)

STOP 2

Lithuania 18 Latvia 14
Lithuania 21 Poland 15 (Gold)

STOP 3

Lithuania 19 Estonia 14
Latvia 20 Lithuania 14
Lithuania 21 Poland 15 (Bronze)


The Lithuanian Women's team consisted of Dalia Donskichytė, Juste Veronika Jocyte, Livija Sakevičiūtė and Egle Zabotkaite.

U23 Women Scores

STOP 1

Lithuania 22 Estonia 8
Lithuania 21 Ukraine 14
Lithuania 21 Latvia 18 (Gold)

STOP 2

Lithuania 19 Poland 11
Lithuania 21 Latvia 11 (Gold)

STOP 3

Lithuania 21 Estonia 5
Lithuania 22 Poland 12
Lithuania 21 Ukraine 13 (Gold)

Justė Jocytė earned enough points in these three stops to vault up to third place in the U18 Women's ramkings!

U18 Women's Rankings

[Hepcat]

Since Dainius Novickas was handed the head coaching reins for Lithuania's entire 3x3 program in January(?) 2021, Lithuania's world ranking has shot up across the board.

Lithuania is now second behind Serbia in the Men's ranking:

Men

Lithuania is second behind Mongolia in the U23 Men's ranking:

U23 Men

Lithuania is third behind Germany and Poland in the Women's ranking:

Women

Lithuania is first in the U23 Women's ranking:

U23 Women

And Lithuania is first overall in the Combined ranking:

Combined

[Hepcat]

The Lithuanian Women got off to an excellent start today in Antwerp with a 21-14 victory over Japan and an 18-16 victory over Germany. The win over Germany was particularly big because Germany is the top seeded Women's team in the tournament.

The Lithuanian Men will play Chile and Mongolia tomorrow while the Women will go up against China and Romania on Wednesday.

2022 World Cup Games