The favorites

If you consider the different tournaments that have been played so far this season, the main teams to win this year’s edition of the competition are Greece and Serbia. After the astonishing dominance in Mannheim, the Greek team around Nikos Pappas showed a great talent level despite missing some inside forces.

On the other hand, the Serbian team, that is build around the FMP Junior Team core of Andrija Milutinovic, Bojan Subotic and Dejan Musli. The non-consideration of Branislav Djekic or Lazar Radosavljevic may be a surprise for some people but still Serbia looks like a clear cut favorite to reach the Gold medal game.

The outsiders

Some other teams can be considered as potential Medal candidates, and those are the traditional teams like Spain, France or Lithuania. The Spanish guys, that will of course play without Ricky Rubio may lack of some size because they don’t have any player taller than 2m06 in their roster. So the paint has to be kept clean by guys like Toni Vicens or Alberto Jodar who either miss the necessary size or are no inside players. The least that one could say is that the Spanish backcourt of David Garcia, Alejandro Hernandez and Dani Perez is ready to face some tough opposition.

I also spoke with Luis from Draftexpress.com and here is his opinion on the Spanish U18 team.

I think Spain has a chance to reach the medals, although I think Serbia is just on an entire different level and no other team should be able to challenge them (perhaps not even Greece, although they are the other top candidate for the final).

Regarding Spain, I like the fact we have a heady PG in Dani Pérez, a skilled guard in Alex Hernández, aggressive and skilled wings in Jorge Santana or Marcos León, both capable of slash and shoot, an all-around physical freak in Alberto Jodar, and finally, we’ve added some size. You probably remember Toni Vicens, the undersized and over weighted hustler quite effective under the rim.

For France, their performance in Mannheim was really bad, but the uncommon practice methods of their coach seem to have some results. Les Bleus won their tournament in Douai behind a great team effort and playing without their supposed best player in person of Christophe Leonard who signed a pro-contract with Cholet recently. Ludovic Puigcerbier, who is following French youth basketball for basketsession.com gave us his thoughts on the chances for the French in Greece:

After a difficult preparation, the French U18 team could hurt more than one team during this year’s U18 competition. Despite some bad results in Mannheim, Euro-Essone and Manzanares, the French team has however beaten teams like Spain, Croatia or Lithuania during their preparation and has also won the tournament in Douai. The team has the necessary talent with players like Christophe Léonard, Andrew Albicy or Alexis Tanghe but we have to see how the team will play and behave during the tournament. But they have the possibilities to beat every team on any given night. On the other hand, the inside sector looks pretty weak though to be a contender for a medal. I think, they will finish between 5th and 7th place.

Lithuania is always present when it comes to Youth Championships. And this year, with super talent Donatas Motiejunas in the middle, Lithuania could eventually be considered as one of the main teams for a medal. But one player does not make them a Gold Medal team as they significantly miss some offensive quality in the back court. For the Lithuanian federation, the official goal is between 3 and 8 but the current results made some people think that this goal will be hard to reach especially if you take into consideration that Motiejunas was injured during two weeks and he is badly wanted by the U20 team to play with them. So eventually, he may leave after a few games if the U18 team can not reach a medal. Because of the lack of potential in the 1990 generation except Motiejunas and Tautvydas Slezas, the coaching staff added some interesting 1991 born guys where especially Gilvydas Biruta showed good talent so far.

Who else do we have?

Another team that has to be mentioned is of course Croatia and their impressive front court composed of Tomislav Zubcic, Mario Delas and Leon Radosevic. With the addition of Toni Prostran in the backcourt since the Albert-Schweitzer Tournament, the team is improving on the talent side but now remains the question if they can translate this into decisive games. The Croats, who should win their group will have their real opponents in the 2nd phase where they will play against France, Russia, Germany or Ukraine.All in all, this side of the table looks a lot easier to reach the semis than the other side where Serbia, Lithuania, Greece, Spain and Italy fight for the two spots most likely.

The Turkish team played also a interesting tournament in Mannheim and showed some stints of talent in Douai too. However, I have some doubts if they can go for it all in Greece as they seem to depend too much on their PF beat Deniz Kiligli who is not the most regular player in the world. They have some good scoring in the backcourt and feature 16yr old Enes Kanter who can dominate in the paint but it really looks like the left-handed hook machine from Fenerbahce is the guy that decides about the performance of the Turkish team. And one bad game may be enough to fall from 1-4th to 5-8th place.

Germany played an interesting tournament in Douai where they won the games they have to win. In their home event in Mannheim, they lost the game they had to win to qualify for the Top8. So Kay Blümel and his team know how good or how bad they can play, especially after the poor performances in Spain a few days ago. But the absence of some of the main players may be a reason for this as explains the German head coach:

After the very bad performance during the tournament in Spain, where we played without six of our first 10 players (Maurice Stuckey, Simon Schmitz, Robert Hülsewede, Femi Oladipo, Niels Giffey and Alexander Schrempf) and lost heavily against Spain, France and Croatia, the motivation of the team was really down low. We tried to improve this during our training camp these days. Unfortunately, we have to play without Oladipo (torn ankle) and Hülsewede (broken foot) during the Championships which lets a big hole on our SF position. Our goal is to reach the third place in our group first of all and avoid the relegation round.

The game against France in the beginning will be extremely important for us, because they have a team that we can beat.  Russia has improved and showed good games in the Moscow tournament and seems hard to beat. Ukraine is the unknown team in our group and it’s hard for me to predict how good they are right now. But as it will be our third game in the tournament, we have enough time to scout them during the Championship. If we reach our goal and qualify for the next phase, we will see how we continue. But we don’t want to become to high on ourselves and remain with both feet on earth. A place somewhere around 9th like last year would be very satisfying for us.

The Russian U18 team was very disappointing in Mannheim but has found a way back to be a serious outsider in Greece after their performances at the Petrenko Cup in Khimki. The squad has beaten Italy, and the Czech Republic while only failing shortly against the top favorites from Greece. Currently, no world class talent has emerged of the 1990 generation in Russia but the mixture of aggressive guards and long tall forwards that characterizes the Russian game is still present. So they are definitely a team to watch in Amaliada and Pyrgos.

Italy that played a correct tournament in Mannheim will see their top talent of the 1991 generation Nicolo Melli joining them. And with this addition on the wing, everything is possible for the Squadra. The young forward may be one of the best talents in Europe and if he can elevate his game to what he showed during the LegaDue semi-finals, he may be the leader that could help the Italians reach an unpredictable success in the tournament.

Fighting for relegation

Belgium went up to Division A in 2007 behind a great team effort and the nice games of Jorn Steinbach and Jean-Marc Mwema. But these two guys are born in 1989 and will not be available anymore. But some talent of the last year’s win is still on the roster and the addition of Yannick Moray should give the team of Fred Wilmot the necessary power in the back court. On the other hand, no real inside presence on this level will be tough to handle.

Israel, who plays Belgium in the group stage may be the team that can avoid relegation the easiest way in beating the before mentioned in their opener. The departure of Daniel Rom back to Russia lets a big whole in the middle of course but the typical fighting spirit and the athleticism of Carmel Bouchman may help them to stay in the league. This opener will be extremely important for both teams.

Estonia will feature one of the most interesting players to follow of the tournament with Siim-Sander Vene who played already a good tournament last season. Next to him, not too much talent is to be seen but maybe it is worth to take a closer look at the 1991 born Kristjan Rinaldo (yes, that’s his name) who put up some correct stats with the U16 last summer and plays for the Honka Academy in Finland.

Not much to say about the Ukrainian team as I barely know any player there and could not find any results or comments on them on the net. The main goal for the team is to stay in the Division as they have a pretty interesting 1991 generation that could compete next season on the highest level.

Lauris Blaus tries to lead his Latvian team to the necessary wins in their group to stay away from the Relegation round. He will hopefully get some support from the talented 1991 generation around Janis Antrops and Harijs Rubenis.

Bulgaria will be built around their back-court combo of Hristo Zahariev and Bozhidar Avramov. I have put them in this part of the preview one loss against Latvia could mean that the team has to play on relegation round. On the other hand, the team has the talent to pass against Croatia or Turkey but I don’t know how they could handle the inside presence of these two nations.

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Finally, we come to the big guys present in Douai. And here, the quality was rather high with some top European talent but also good prospects from Africa and the United States.

Donatas Motiejunas was of course the most talented of all the players in Douai. But he did not manage to lift his team higher than the 7th place. Is it the lack of quality guards in his Lithuanian U18 National or is Motiejunas not a go-to-guy type and leader? This is one of the questions that I asked myself after the tournament. His up and down performances and his trend to be quickly frustrated may make me tend to the second choice.

However, the great talent skill set that Motiejunas displays has no equivalent in Douai. Being 2m14 tall and showing barely and kind of major weaknesses in his game is quite an amazing asset. Posting up and scoring on nearly every ball he receives down low is not a problem as scoring from outside or on the drive. Motiejunas has also no problem to put the ball on the floor and we saw him several times bringing up the ball in fast break situations, and even going for a perfectly timed behind the back pass.

On the downside, Motiejunas seems really to be mentally not always focused or getting frustrated really quick after one or two missed plays. In the last game of the tournament, where he looked really motivated, he came up with way too many three-point shots in the end which he all missed. There was no reason for doing that and it raised once again the mental questions. Still, Motiejunas is probably behind Ricky Rubio the best prospect of the European 1990 generation.

Leon Radosevic is the real inside force for the Croatians. Great athlete and highly aggressive, Radosevic uses his large frame and great physical strength to be a dominator in the paint. As he can run well the floor, he is also a big asset in the fast break where he can conclude as a trailer with powerful dunks.

When he is working on the post, he draws a lot of fouls despite having any real go-to-move he likes to ue. He is more a banger who tries to go with his force to the rim, mostly after facing the basket. When he gets doubled, he can go for the pass to the cutter as well. His jump shot goes until around the key, even it looks not particularly precise from this area.

He prefers to go for the drive as he is mostly guarded by big guys that are slower than him. However, if you close his right hand he has a lot more problems to put the ball on the floor with the left and tries to go for spin moves to come back to his stronger right hand. In defense, he is present in rebounding and can become a big shot blocker.

Maik Zirbes did a nice job in the paint for the German team. He has a massive body and good size and athleticism. However, he was really afraid when playing against Team USA in the semis but did a good job offensively against Croatia for the third place.

His offensive arsenal is based on post-up play and pick-and-roll. From the post up position, Zirbes can score with a sort of jump hook which he protects with his massive body. He is doing pretty well on pick-and-roll situations where he rolls perfectly to the open spots in the lane to score on lay-ups. Additionally, he is a decent passer for a player of his size.

Despite great athletic abilities, he comes up with some soft moves when he has to attack the rim. This is not really understandable as he can go for huge powerful dunks even over people when he tries to. Zirbes also has three point range, but barely shots from the with the national team. Defensively, he was very weak. Laterally, he showed no real speed in defense but I think it is more a question will than anything else.

Enes Kanter was not the impressive presence that he was in Mannheim this time. Still, when he receives the ball down low, he is hard to stop. But this, most of the teams doubled him immediately and he sometimes does not know exactly what to do. When he forced to go to the rim, he even sometimes managed to score then. However, being 2 years younger than the competition, he must be considered as a tremendous prospect for the future.

Tanguy Ramassany is not the type of player that you see in this type of report. But he is a player I personally liked a lot. A massive inside player with no real offensive game but the hard will to do his dirty job in the rebound. Ramassany fights in the paint and is giving the opponents a hard job to attack against him. Far from being a high-level prospect, Ramassany can end up as a great defensive role player in a few years.

Kenny Frease was the best center of the tournament and I can approve that. Really wide body with some interesting moves back to the basket are the main characteristics of his play. He is not the biggest athlete in the world but he is making some damage due to his physical presence. He should be a nice addition for the Xavier Basketball program.

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Back in the Salle Corot for the Finals day of the tournament and the most important games of the week.

• The first game in the morning saw the nice victory of Lithuania against a tired Adidas Nations team Africa. The Baltic guys won it in the end 90-73 but their dominance was bigger than the result. For Lithuania, Donatas Motiejunas showed his huge skillset to finished with 30pts, 7rebs and 2 steals. Nobody could really stop him and he just hurt his three point percentage (1/6) in the end by overshooting from outside. He look in general a lot more motivated than yesterday. He got some nice support from the surprising Edvardas Pikalavicius with 13pts and 8rebs. For the Africans, we saw big scoring from Mohamed Koita who netted 35pts but lost 5 balls. Another good game in the tournament came from Bandja Sy who had 19pts.
• The game for the 5th place between Turkey and Israel was extremely close. When the time was running up, nobody could take the decisive lead and we went into overtime. Here, the Turkish depth helped to bring this one home and end at the 5th place after the 99-89 win after 45 minutes of game action. For the winners, Maxim Mutaf started great in the first half but his scoring lead was taken over by Melih Mahmutoglu in the second half. In the paint, Enes Kanter did not start the game and only played in the second half. In those 27 minutes, he was once again dominating every body with his force and scored 21 in just 27 minutes. For Israel, Liran Moran shot well from everywhere and finished the game with a team high 22. Ron Sabag did a good job on the point where he scored the big FTs in the money time of Q4 and dished out 11 assists additionally.
• The Bronze medal game of the 2008 edition of the Douai World Tournament saw Croatia beating Germany by 3 points. The Germans had the chance to go into overtime but the last attempt of Simon Schmitz from behind the arc went not in. It was a match-up of the big guys in the paint with Maik Zirbes (22/5) facing of against Mario Delas (15/12/4) and Leon Radosevic (25/5/3). Toni Prostran was defended well by the German guards but scored however 22pts at 8/18 attempts. For Germany, it was a huge difference with what they did yesterday against Team USA while Croatia that played without their most talented player in Tomislav Zubcic did a very nice job by reaching this third place, a huge improvement to their performances in Mannheim this spring.
• The Final game of the tournament saw Team USA playing against the home crowd favorites France. And it was the French team that finished with the Tournament victory in the end. After a very disappointing showing in Mannheim, the team from the Hexagon managed to win Douai despite having a world-class talent in his roster, something that was the case mostly in the last years. It was the Finals MVP Andrew Albicy that led France in the decisive minutes with his long distance shooting and drives. He finished the game with 19pts and 5asts. But it was the defense that made the French win who lack a great scorer.
• The All-Tournament team that has been elected is the following:
• PG Andrew Albicy (France)
• SG Toni Prostran (Croatia)
• SF Carmel Bouchman (Israel)
• PF Mamadou Samb (Adidas Nations Africa)
• C Kenny Frease (Adidas Nationas USA)
• If you are interested if Video material from the tournament, contact me via email and I can send you an offer for DVDs of the games (christophe.ney@europeanprospects.com)
• During the next days, I will post detailed reports on the different players that were present

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When we talk about Cibona Zagreb, we have of course to mention Tomislav Zubcic. During the AST this spring, I had already made a first report about the Croatian forward, so here I will just come up with an update of this report. I don’t have to mention that fantastic combination of size and skills that the Croatian forward displays. He played a lot of SF during the tournament where he could use his speed and size. Despite showing decent individual statistics, Zubcic is still not the leader that can make his team winning. This has already been the case with the Croatian U18 team in Mannheim and is still the case with Cibona in Madrid. Also what I wanted to add is that his shot position is not always perfect. He loves to go for some fade-away shots when it is not necessary which results in perfectible shooting percentages. As I said, I don’t go for the outstanding individual skills; the only thing I want to add in this area is that Zubcic displayed great rebounding will throughout the tournament.

Leon Radosevic has also already been featured during the Albert-Schweitzer Tournament so here is also only a short update on what he displayed in Madrid. Playing mostly really inside where he wants to use his above average athleticism for European standards to overpower his opponents. Unfortunately, this ends up sometimes in forced moves which he has to limit. On the other hand, this style of plays gives him a lot of FTs to shot where he has some room for improvement left as he scored only 63% of his attempts.

Nikola Mirotic (2m06 – PF – 1991 – Real Madrid)

Here we have another example of the already typical European power forward. Large shooting range until the three point line, good size, correct athleticism and so on. Mirotic had his worst game when I was there, so it is difficult to judge his level. But he is player that has nice potential because of his excellent fundamentals, good size and nice shot until the three point area. He showed several times some kind of nice back to the basket move with a turn-around, fake and then a sort of up and under to avoid the block shot. He also had interesting shooting skills out of the dribble with notably a 3pt fake,1 driblle and then a step back to swish it from long range two. Definitely a player to watch in the future.

Ryan Richards (2m06 – C – 1991 – Real Madrid)

First of all, the British Center was only one that could stop Dejan Musli in any kind of way, by playing him extremely physical. But is that enough to make him a great prospect, I don’t know. Richards displayed everything you need to become a good one one day. On the other side, I did not like at all his behavior on the court. But coming to his game, he showed some very fine moves with his back to basket and was extremely present in offensive rebounding. He has range until the three point line from where he can hit shots without any problem. Being a nice athlete, that helps him a lot but he should be even more present in blocking shots. What bothered me also was the fact that Richards took nearly every time a shot on his own when he got the ball and never went for the pass. This may be considered as a pretty selfish attitude especially when your team is trailing by 30 points like it was the case against FMP Zeleznik.

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After having analyzed in the detail the four best placed European nations of the tournament, I will come back to the other European teams, unfortunately only in a shorter fashion as I saw these teams only once in Mannheim. Also, I will limit myself really to the main players of these teams in order to not go too much in the detail.

Tomislav Zubcic (2m08 – Forward – Croatia)

Zubcic was probably the biggest pure basketball talent of the whole tournament. Nearly seven foot tall, incredibly quick for his size and able to play both the forward positions as well as PG if necessary. In the only game of him where I was present, he showed all he can do in just one quarter. Post-ups against smaller guys, jump hooks, finger roll finishes after powerful drives, but also a very nice eye for his team mates and three point shots without any problem.

The Croatian was clearly also the go-to-guy of his team and he tried to play the big points. However he failed sometimes but also came up with nice plays. He still needs to improve his passing timing to become also a perfect passer even if he was the third best passer of the tournament. But his huge number of turnovers shows how often he has the ball in his hands. He is definitely one of the players to follow in the future. I did not agree on his selection in the All-Tournament team not because of a missing talent but of the poor results of the team.

Femi Oladipo (1m99 – Forward – Germany)

The German SF was probably one of the surprises of the tournament. With his athletic playing style, the Bremerhaven forward was the top scorer of the German team. He is a good offensive rebounder and scores a lot around the rim. He has 3pt range, but only took 2 shots from behind the arc, and he netted both of them. His shooting mechanics have to be improved, he has no fluid jump shot move to score. He can finish with both hands close to the basket and has good control of his body. 

Leon Radosevic (2m08 – Forward – Croatia)

Another interesting player from the very strong Croatian front-court. Radosevic showed a very good mid-distance shot and he rebounds strongly. He is not driving that much, relying more on his jump shot which he can also nail in the big moments of a game. Radosevic is highly athletic and is present on the shot blocking section as well. He was the top scorer of the Croatian team during the tournament with also very good shooting percentages.

Honorable Mentions

Other player that I noted were: the Russian forward Vladimir Ivlev, a 2m04 inside player who a nice defensive presence in the paint and also showed some interesting offensive moves. Pasquale Paolisso, an Italian forward who excelled in the rebounding and inside working section to score multiple free-throws. Maik Zirbes, the large German center who was the top rebounder of the team and showed some powerful moves around the basket. Simon Schmitz did a nice job as PG of the German team. He drives a lot to the basket and can control the game very well.

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