Category: International Basketball Blog

International basketball blog

Several Blazers to be busy with FIBA World Cup qualifiers

Here’s NBC Sports Northwest reporting on a pair of Trail Blazers players who will be busy with international competition as the NBA season approaches:

When the Portland Trail Blazers get together for pre-camp workouts soon, they are going to be without two players who were starters last season. And those two players could be missing right up to or past the start of training camp on Sept. 25.

Al-Farouq Aminu (Nigeria) and Jusuf Nurkic (Bosnia and Herzegovena) are scheduled to represent their countries in the 2019 FIBA World Cup qualifying rounds. The format of the World Cup has been changed and teams now will be required to play qualifying rounds in 2018 to move into the 2019 Cup finals, scheduled to be played in China.

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Darrun Hilliard signs with team in Spain

Here’s Euroleague.net with news that a former NBA player has signed to play in Spain:

Hoping to return to the Final Four that will be hosted next spring in its own city for the first time, KIROLBET Baskonia Vitoria Gasteiz found some perimeter talent right before training camp starts, announcing on Monday the addition of swingman Darrun Hilliard to its roster for the 2018-19 Turkish Airlines EuroLeague season. Hilliard (1.98 meters, 25 years old) has played his entire three-year pro career to date in the NBA, including 14 games last season with San Antonio.

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Mavs sign Ding Yanyuhang, who has played professionally in China for years

The Dallas Mavericks yesterday signed guard-forward Ding Yanyuhang (pronounced yin-you-hong).

Ding (6-7, 205) has spent the last seven seasons playing professionally for China’s Shandong Golden Stars. In 45 games for Shandong in 2017-18, he averaged 26.0 points, 5.2 rebounds, 3.2 assists and 1.6 steals per game en route to winning his second consecutive Chinese Basketball Association Domestic MVP award.

Ding played on the Mavericks’ Orlando and Las Vegas summer league teams in 2017.

The Xinjiang, China native has represented the Chinese national team in international competition, including the 2016 Olympic Games.

Nets to honor legacy of Drazen Petrovic

On Monday the Nets will celebrate the legacy of the late Drazen Petrovic. It’s been 25 years since the Hall of Famer’s tragic death, and a quarter of a century later he still hasn’t been forgotten — or replaced.

From the giveaway Petrovic figurines to the video tribute to his mother, Biserka, being welcomed from Croatia, the night will be about Petrovic, whose red, white and blue No. 3 was retired by the Nets after his death in 1993.

“This guy,” ex-teammate Kenny Anderson told The Post, “was special.”

Voted the best European player ever by players at the 2013 FIBA European Basketball Championship, Petrovic led legions of European youngsters to take up the game behind him, and led a rising young Nets team to the playoffs in both of his full seasons in New Jersey — until an offseason automobile accident cut his life short at just 28.

— NY Post

Stephon Marbury may soon wrap up his basketball career

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Stephon Marbury made waves as a star in the NBA, then even bigger waves as a superstar in China. Here’s the latest from The Undefeated on his basketball career, which may soon be wrapping up:

Two-time NBA All-Star Stephon Marbury told ESPN’s The Undefeated that he is at peace with his 22-year professional basketball career ending in China on Feb. 11 — just days before he turns 41 years old.

Marbury plays for the China Basketball Association’s Beijing Fly Dragons, who play their regular-season finale on Feb. 11 against Jiangsu Tongxi and will not play in the postseason.

The three-time CBA champion says he is “tired” and plans to return to his offseason home in Los Angeles after his finale in China. While Marbury also plans to stay in shape — “just in case” an NBA team calls this season — he says he’s “at peace” with his pro career ending in China.

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Stephon Marbury and Jimmer Fredette go at it in China

Here’s the New York Daily News reporting on some basketball fun in China involving players NBA fans will know:

Stephon Marbury doesn’t look like he’s happy about Jimmer Fredette making waves in the Chinese Basketball Association.

The two ex-Knicks got into an altercation during a game in China between the Beijing Fly Dragons and Shanghai Sharks following a hard foul.

Fredette was driving for a layup late in the third quarter when Marbury tried to stop him from scoring. Marbury made contact with Fredette on his way up, knocking the ball out of his hands, and the forward didn’t appreciate it.

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Australian bball teams set to play exhibitions vs NBA squads

NBA preseason games against non-NBA opponents are always interesting, in that for the NBA team the event is a mere warmup in preparation for the regular season, while for the non-NBA team it’s a chance to win respect, gain some fame, impress their home fans, and treat the game as an important contest. Here’s the Deseret News reporting:

The Sydney Kings’ team website is billing its exhibition game against the Utah Jazz Monday night at Vivint Arena as the “Match Up to end all Match Ups.”

While that’s probably overselling a contest that will take place in early October, the occasion is a historic one, as it marks the first time a team from Australia’s National Basketball League will have taken on an NBA squad.

The game is the opening act of a trio of contests between the NBA and NBL over the next two weeks that will also see Melbourne United play the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Brisbane Bullets face the Phoenix Suns.

Kings head coach Andrew Gaze, a legend in Australian basketball who played in five Olympic games and had NBA stints with the old Washington Bullets and the San Antonio Spurs, is confident these contests will have a big impact on hoops in his country, regardless of what the scoreboard may say when the final buzzers sound.

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Lots of preseason travel for Timberwolves

The Timberwolves are doing a ton of traveling this preseason. The good kind of traveling. Where you get on planes and go visit interesting places. Not the bad kind of travel, where the referee is forced to blow a whistle at you. Well, maybe they’ll do that as well. We’ll see! Anyway, here’s the Minneapolis Star Tribune:

The Timberwolves rolled out the basketballs on a new season Saturday morning, convening in a University of California-San Diego gym more than 1,500 miles away from their downtown Minneapolis training facility.

Why, you very well might ask?

Well, it’s sort of on their way to China, where they will play two preseason games against defending NBA champion Golden State next week.

It’s also a sunny and chic version of Mankato, Minn., — former training-camp home to both the Wolves and the NFL’s Vikings — and a getaway where they’ll drill during the day with the Pacific Ocean shimmering in the distance and bond at night.

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2018 G League Showcase set for January 10-13

The NBA G League announced today the 26-game schedule for NBA G League Showcase 2018. The premier in-season scouting event will feature the league’s 26 teams playing two regular-season games each from Jan. 10-13 in Mississauga, Ontario, home of Raptors 905.

For the first time, the NBA G League Showcase will be played across two courts: the Hershey Centre, home of Raptors 905, and the adjoining Mississauga SportZone complex. Game times will be staggered to allow fans and scouts to see all the action.

The 14th NBA G League Showcase will feature seven games on each of the first three days and five games on the final day. The event tips off with a matchup between the Santa Cruz Warriors and Grand Rapids Drive at 12 p.m. ET on Wednesday, Jan. 10.

Raptors 905 will play its first game of the Showcase on Thursday, Jan. 11, when the team faces the Warriors at 12 p.m. ET. The event host will also meet the Sioux Falls Skyforce on Saturday, Jan. 13 at 12 p.m. ET, the first game of the final day. All 26 of the games are between cross-conference opponents.

Juan Carlos Navarro and FC Barcelona form long-term agreement

Juan Carlos Navarro and FC Barcelona Lassa like each other. They really like each other. Here’s Eurocupbasketball.com reporting:

Expect to see the legendary Juan Carlos Navarro remain at the heart of FC Barcelona Lassa’s basketball ambitions in the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague for a long time to come. On Tuesday, the club announced a new 10-year agreement with Navarro that will cover the rest of his playing career and continue into a new era for him as part of the management of the club’s basketball section. The announcement came as soon as Navarro returned to the team after winning another medal at EuroBasket. The club communicated that at the end of the coming season, Navarro and Barcelona will decide together whether the ageless EuroLeague icon will continue playing or move to the front office.