BallinEurope, the European Basketball news site

Exactly what the title says then – BallinEurope takes a look at the seedings for the EuroBasket 2013 draw and riffs a bit. As we know, the six groups from which the final divisions will be comprised look as follows.

No. 1 seeds: Spain, France, Russia, FYR Macedonia

No. 2 seeds: Lithuania, Greece, Slovenia, Great Britain

No. 3 seeds: Italy, Croatia, Germany, Montenegro

No. 4 seeds: Finland, Poland, Ukraine, Bosnia & Herzegovina

No. 5 seeds: Georgia, Belgium, Latvia, Turkey

No. 6 seeds: Czech Republic, Serbia, Israel, Sweden

Mulled-over reactions follow.

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Sanli: Glue guy, team player

Now that the proverbial fat lady has sung, BiE goes through 10 names European basketball and NBA fans might want to keep track of in the medium-term future – some of these guys are certainly destined for international stardom before decade’s end. Please note that the following are not necessarily the best players in the tournament, but rather those who BiE believes have the most upside or could simply surprise those not in-the-know once they’ve risen to the next level.

BiE’s “Who’s Who” from the 2012 NIJT includes the following.

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Just completed was the deciding game in Group A of the Nike International Junior Tournament – and for Crvena Zvezda the results were ugly indeed.

While Dusan Ristic had his now-standard killer game for the Croatian side with 21 points and 10 rebounds, the tenacious play of the Lithuanians (clearly still rolling from their incredible second half against FC Barcelona yesterday) resulted in a huge 105-69 victory for Lietuvos Rytas. Augustinas Jankaitis chased his double-double of 16/13 yesterday – and augmented his chances of ultimately being named MVP of this tourney – with an amazing 30-point, 11-rebound performance.

Once again, Crvena Zvezda appeared to consciously eschew a physical game, a style which this Lithuanian side is not at all afraid to play. L. Rytas won the battle of the boards handily, with 39 against the Red Star’s mere 26.

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As befits tradition, the 2012 Nike International Junior Tournament is running in parallel with the Euroleague Final Four competition in Istanbul. Eight youth league teams are competing for the grand prize – and, individually speaking, to garner some attention from club scouts as each player’s career burgeons on the big stage.

In the bigger picture, the NIJT games (and introductory qualifying tournaments) also serve as a handy barometer of club play on the national level. After day one, then, it’s good news for Croatia and Lithuania, whose homegrown squads swept, and bad news for Turkey, as powerhouses Fenerbahçe Ülker and Anadolu Efes both lost. And what’s up with FC Barcelona…?

KK Zagreb 79, Fenerbahçe Ülker 76
As though The Next Big Thing Out Of Croatia, a.k.a. 2011 NIJT MVP Dario Saric, weren’t enough, NIJT competitors will also apparently now have to take notice of Dominik Mavra as well. While Saric put in a ridiculous man-among-boys performance of 26 points, 17 rebounds, six assists and five steals, Mavra “added” 30 points and six boards as the pair consistently foiled any attempt by Fenerbahçe to establish their tempo: Each went to the free-throw line 12 times in the game and accounted for over 70% of the Croatian side’s points.

Crvena Zvezda 86, FC Barcelona Regal 77
The much-touted Blaugrana suffered a disappointing performance against Crvena Zvezda to take a nine-point loss after going up 18-12 in the first quarter and 20-15 after 10 minutes of play. Worse for Spanish basketball, Barcelona’s main contributors were foreigners Ludde “El Matador Sueco” Hakanson, Nick Spires and Alexandr Zhigulin. Crvena Zvezda’s big men pretty much had their way with Barça’s – even Spires’ 13 points belies his frustrating 4-of-15 overall shooting – as Serbia’s Dusan Ristic put in a crushing 23-point, 12-rebound (including six offensive) show.

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Congratulations from BallinEurope go out to KK Zagreb Croatia Osiguranje, who are the 2011 Nike International Junior Tournament champions after defeating Žalgiris Kaunas, 76-65, in the championship match this morning. A few observations on the match, if you will…

• First and foremost, there’s Dario Saric. You don’t need BiE to tell you to believe the hype on this dude billed as the next Toni Kukoc after he notched a triple-double of 15/12/10 in this game, but whoa was Saric head and shoulders above the field today.

Saric displayed an incredible all-around game featuring rebounding, leading the fast break, beating his man off the dribble and gorgeous no-look passes – and all this came on the first two Zagreb possessions. Even when his shooting touch was off early (he went for just 3-of-12 shooting in the first half), Saric still established himself as a serious presence in the middle that forced the ball into Žalgiris’ undersized guards’ hands. And the Lithuanian side managed just a woeful 2-of-18 outside the paint in the first half as a result.

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Running in parallel with the 2011 Euroleague Final Four is the Nike International Junior Tournament, featuring eight teams from around the world (okay, seven from Europe and one from China, technically) packed with youthful prospects moving up the professional ladder. Below, BallinEurope enumerates a few of the players who’ve piqued the interest. And no, this isn’t everyone we’re looking at; most likely, a couple more profiles will be posted tomorrow…

Dario Saric, KK Zagreb – In the opening match against INSEP, Saric played the entire 40 minutes, filling up the stat sheet with an incredible line of 19 points, 13 rebounds, four assists, three steals and two blocks. In helping Zagreb crush FMP the following day, Saric again produced the best numbers of the day with 17 points (including 7-of-8 shooting on free throws), six boards, eight assists and four steals. More incredibly, this happened in “just” 33 minutes of playing time, as the lad fouled out in the fourth quarter.

The only downside to Saric’s game would appear to be some slightly shaky ball-handling skills. Hampered further by the tendency to send the ball through him on literally nearly every trip down the floor – BiE has rarely seen an NIJT player draw so damn many double teams – Saric went for a combined 11 turnovers in the two games.

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Rosters for the 2011 Nike Hoop Summit have been released and while The Continent is well-represented on the World Select Team, BallinEurope considers there to be at least one shocking omission.

Team World will include Davis Bertans (Latvia/Union Olimpija); Evan Fournier (France/Poitiers); Przemyslaw Karnowski (Poland/SMS PZKosz); Mateusz Ponitka (Poland/Tempcold AZS); and Dario Saric (Croatia/KK Zagreb). Other players on the club are Canadians Kyle Wiltjer and Kevin Pangos, plus Brazilians Lucas Nogueira and Raul Neto.

Anybody else identify the missing name…? That’s right: This would seem to be another slap in the face for basketball’s most famous neo-Kentucky Wildcat, Enes Kanter. Kanter had told media last week that he’d be entering the NBA Draft and that he “expect[ed] to play for the International team in the Nike Hoop Summit in Portland, Ore., on April 9, where he would face UK recruits Michael Gilchrist, Anthony Davis and Marquis Teague.”

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The NBA’s Basketball Without Borders has wrapped its European edition for 2010, the first-ever such camp in Spain. On-hand to represent the NBA were The Gasol Brothers, Rudy Fernández, Vladimir Radmanovic, Serge Ibaka, Marcus Camby, Jason Terry, Chicago Bulls assistant coach Ron Adams and Indiana Pacers assistant coach Dick Harter.

After three days of drilling and practicing on the parts of the 1993- and 1994-born lot, Sunday activities culminated in a pair of games followed by a third “all-star game” with the top U16s there. The matchups for the final 32-minute match were comprised of:

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