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International Notes: Schröder, Theis, Giannis, Satoransky

August 21st, 2022 at 10:40am CST by Arthur Hill

Free agent guard Dennis Schröder won’t accompany his German teammates to Sweden for Thursday’s opening game of the FIBA World Cup Qualifiers, according to Eurohoops. Schröder is recovering from an ankle injury he suffered in the Hamburg Super Cup tournament and will remain in Germany for treatment. There’s a chance he may recover in time for next Sunday’s home contest against Slovenia.

Schröder remains unsigned after splitting last season with the Celtics and Rockets. Although he received positive reviews in Houston after being acquired at the trade deadline, the team is emphasizing youth and doesn’t appear interested in bringing back Schröder.

Germany is already without Pacers center Daniel Theis, who will miss the World Cup Qualifiers and possibly next month’s EuroBasket tournament due to an undisclosed injury. He is training individually and being monitored by the German national team’s medical staff, according to Johnny Askounis of Eurohoops.

The Germans are also missing Maxi Kleber, Moritz Wagner and Isaac Bonga due to injuries.

There’s more international news to pass along:

  • Bucks star Giannis Antetokounmpo sat out Greece’s final exhibition game with back soreness, but he’s expected to be ready for Thursday’s World Cup Qualifier against Serbia, Askounis writes in a separate story. Antetokounmpo underwent an MRI that showed no damage to his back.
  • NBA players Dario Saric, Ivica Zubac and Bojan Bogdanovic are all on the final roster for Croatia, Eurohoops reports. Mario Hezonja is also part of the Croatian team, which missed out on the World Cup Qualifiers but will participate in EuroBasket. Saric sat out all of last season with a torn right ACL.
  • Czech Republic guard Tomas Satoransky appears to have avoided a major injury to his right ankle, Eurohoops adds in another piece. Satoransky was hurt in Saturday’s game against Germany, and while there has been no official announcement on his condition, Czech reporter Jakub Kanta offered encouraging news. “The X-ray has already ruled out a fracture,” he tweeted, “but the extent of the injury will only be determined by an MRI in the Czech Republic after the swelling subsides.” Satoransky recently signed with FC Barcelona after spending six seasons in the NBA.
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Gustavo Ayon Announces Retirement

August 20th, 2022 at 3:35pm CST by JD Shaw

Veteran center Gustavo Ayon has announced his retirement from professional basketball, as relayed by EuroHoops. Ayon will have a farewell game on Sunday in Guadalajara, Mexico.

“It did not take long,” Ayon said about deciding to retire, according to EuroHoops. “Throughout my career, I learned to take care of my body, when I could be effective and when I couldn’t. I need more than 24 hours to recover after a game. I am retiring fully and at a good level as a player.”

Ayon, who went undrafted in 2007, made his NBA debut in 2012 and played in 135 total regular season games, making stops with New Orleans, Orlando, Milwaukee and Atlanta. The 37-year-old held per-game averages of 4.7 points and 4.4 rebounds during those outings, playing an average of 16.5 minutes.

In addition to his NBA experience, Ayon spent many years competing in international leagues. He played in Mexico from 2006-09, Spain from 2009-11 and 2014-19, and Russia in 2019/20 before returning to Mexico to finish his career.

“I wanted to play basketball and be successful in teams having an important individual role,” Ayon said. “For me, that is much better than playing for 10 or 15 years in the NBA,”

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Team USA Announces Camp Roster For AmeriCup

August 19th, 2022 at 11:56am CST by Luke Adams

At the same time that 24 European nations will be competing in this year’s long-awaited EuroBasket tournament, Team USA will be going for gold in the 2022 AmeriCup, another event that hasn’t taken place in five years. The U.S. team won the 2017 AmeriCup and was preparing to defend its title in 2021 before the event was pushed back a year due to the delay of the Tokyo Olympics.

With the 2022 AmeriCup around the corner, Team USA has announced the 15 players who will take part in training camp from August 23-27 in Las Vegas before the squad chooses a 12-man roster for the September event. Those 15 players are as follows:

While not every player on Team USA’s training camp roster has NBA experience, many do, including Meeks (539 regular season games), Cole (360), McCaw (199), Clark (170), Johnson (103), Mason (103), and Pargo (86). Sword, Cheatham, Lamb, and Zimmerman have also made brief NBA appearances.

The U.S. team will be coached by Jazz assistant Alex Jensen.

The AmeriCup, also known as the Americas Basketball Championship, used to be part of the qualifying process for the Olympics and the FIBA World Cup, but now it’s a stand-alone event.

This year’s tournament will take place from September 2-11 in Recife, Brazil. Sixteen teams have been divided into four groups of four teams apiece. After each team plays three round robin games within its group, the top two teams in each group – along with the two best third-place teams – will move onto the quarterfinals.

Team USA will be seeking its eighth overall AmeriCup gold medal and its first back-to-back golds since winning the event in 1997 and 1999.

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Isaac Bonga Signs With Bayern Munich

August 19th, 2022 at 7:38am CST by Luke Adams

Free agent forward Isaac Bonga is headed back overseas, having signed a two-year contract with Bayern Munich, the German team announced today in a press release.

The 39th overall pick in the 2018 NBA draft, Bonga spent time with the Lakers, Wizards, and Raptors over the past four seasons, averaging 3.1 PPG and 2.2 RPG in 143 total games (13.1 MPG).

Although he spent the entire 2021/22 season in Toronto, Bonga played an extremely limited role, logging just 69 total minutes in 15 appearances. He saw more action in the G League, putting up 12.7 PPG, 9.1 RPG, and 3.5 APG in 25 regular season contests (26.9 MPG) for the Raptors 905, Toronto’s NBAGL affiliate.

According to Donatas Urbonas of BasketNews.com, who first reported Bonga’s agreement with Bayern Munich, the 22-year-old drew some NBA interest as a free agent this summer. However, given how little he played at the NBA level last season, Bonga presumably recognized that a return to Europe would be his best chance at guaranteed money and a more expansive role.

Bonga was born in Germany and began his professional career in his home country, playing for Skyliners Frankfurt’s reserve team from 2016-18. This time around, he’ll be competing in a pair of Europe’s top leagues — Bayern Munich is a member of both Germany’s Basketball Bundesliga (BBL) and the EuroLeague.

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And-Ones: Doncic, International Prospects, Playoff Contenders, Bluiett

August 18th, 2022 at 9:26pm CST by Alex Kirschenbaum

Mavericks All-Star guard Luka Doncic is hoping to win it all at EuroBasket this year, per Eurohoops. The 6’7″ guard is playing for his native Slovenia in the competition. Led by Doncic and countryman Goran Dragic, the Slovenian national team won EuroBasket in 2017. Dragic retired from international play after the event — but unretired in time to suit up this year’s event.

“We are going to Germany [the locale for the event] to win gold,” Doncic told reporters. “In every competition where we compete, the goal must always be the first place. We will do everything for it, but we will see if we make it. In 2017, no one took us seriously when we announced our attack on the gold medal, today is different. It’s nice when you see that everyone will make an extra effort against us to win.”

Here are more odds and ends from around the basketball world:

  • The 2022 FIBA U18 European Championship in Izmir, Turkey featured several intriguing international NBA prospects, as Jonathan Givony of ESPN (Insider link) writes. Givony, evaluating the best candidates among the young talent, considers two French players – versatile shooting guard Sidy Cissoko and defensive-oriented small forward Rayan Rupert – to be the most exciting players at the event.
  • With NBA training camps just a month away and many of the summer’s big transactions in the rear view, Tim Bontemps and Kevin Pelton of ESPN assess which clubs have fully committed to succeeding in the present, and how much of their future leverage they have surrendered to get to this point.
  • Former Pelicans two-way player Trevon Bluiett has agreed to terms on a deal with Polish club MKS Dabrowa Gornicza, a source informs our own JD Shaw (Twitter link). The 27-year-old wing went undrafted out of Xavier in 2018 before joining the Pelicans via a two-way contract. He toiled with NBAGL clubs the Westchester Knicks and the Salt Lake City Stars until 2021, but never ended up making his regular season NBA debut. The 6’6″ swingman subsequently went overseas, playing for clubs in Turkey and Germany.
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More Than 30 NBA Players On Track To Suit Up For EuroBasket

August 18th, 2022 at 11:00am CST by Luke Adams

The first EuroBasket tournament in five years will tip off in two weeks and there are currently 34 NBA players on track to participate in the event, representing 17 different countries, according to Johnny Askounis of Eurohoops.net.

EuroBasket is a 24-team international basketball competition also known as the European Basketball Championship. It historically took place every two years, but that gap was recently adjusted to four years, emulating the FIBA World Cup schedule.

The last EuroBasket tournament was played in 2017 — the next one had been scheduled for 2021, but was pushed back due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the postponement of the Tokyo Olympics. As a result, after being played every two years since 1947, it has now been five years since the last EuroBasket tournament, easily the longest layoff since World War II.

It’s possible that some NBA players will be cut from their teams’ rosters or will have to drop out due to injuries or personal reasons before the event begins on September 1, but in general enthusiasm to participate in the long-awaited event appears high.

Here’s the list of NBAers currently set to play in EuroBasket, per Eurohoops:

There are also multiple NBA free agents on EuroBasket rosters, including French swingman Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot and German guard Dennis Schröder.

A number of young NBA players, such as 2022 draftees Jeremy Sochan and Nikola Jovic, have dropped out to focus on getting ready for the 2022/23 season, while others, including Bogdan Bogdanovic (Serbia) and Frank Ntilikina (France), were ruled out due to injuries.

Round robin play will begin on September 1, with each team facing the other five clubs in its group once. The top four teams in each group will advance to a 16-team bracket that begins on September 10. The final will take place on September 18, just over a week before NBA training camps get underway.

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Heat, Spurs To Play In Mexico City In December

August 17th, 2022 at 9:15am CST by Luke Adams

The NBA will return to Mexico City this season for the first time since 2019, with the league confirming in a press release that the Heat and Spurs will play a regular season game at the Arena CDMX on December 17.

According to the NBA, the game will be the league’s 31st in Mexico over the last three decades — the Rockets and Mavericks played the first preseason game in Mexico back in 1992. The Spurs, who will likely be the “home” team, have made an effort to market themselves in the country in recent years, having also participated in games in Mexico in 2017 and 2019.

“We have played six games in Mexico City and every time thousands of Spurs fans showed up, making us feel loved and right at home,” Spurs CEO RC Buford said in a statement. “We are grateful for our loyal fans in Mexico and are thrilled for the opportunity to play in front of them as part of our 50th anniversary season. This is one way we continue to purposefully engage and celebrate our growing number of fans in Mexico.”

The COVID-19 pandemic derailed the NBA’s plans to play in international markets during the last couple seasons, but the league appears set to make up for lost time in 2022/23. In addition to the Mexico City showcase, the NBA has also announced a regular season game in Paris, as well as preseason contests in Abu Dhabi and Tokyo.

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And-Ones: Election Day, Free Agent History, Kurucs, Hall Of Fame

August 16th, 2022 at 10:09pm CST by Dana Gauruder

In an effort to encourage fans, players, staff members and arena workers to vote in the midterm elections, the NBA will not play any games on Election Day, Tuesday, November 8, the league’s communications department tweets. The scheduling decision came out of the league’s focus on promoting nonpartisan civic engagement. Some of the league’s practice facilities and arenas have been used as polling places.

We have more from around the basketball world:

  • Ben Wallace, Shawn Marion and Kevin Durant. Those are some of the players chosen by HoopsHype’s Frank Urbina as the best free agent signings in the history of the Pistons, Mavericks and Warriors, respectively. Urbina makes his top free agent selections for every team in the league.
  • Former NBA forward Rodions Kurucs is close to signing with Spanish team Real Betis Baloncesto, Emiliano Carchia of Sportando reports. Kurucs has appeared in 131 NBA games, including a total of 21 with Brooklyn, Milwaukee and Houston during the 2020/21 campaign. He played with KK Partizan in Serbia last season. Kurucs saw action in four Summer League contests with the Raptors last month.
  • Manu Ginobili will be presented by longtime Spurs teammate and Hall of Fame inductee Tim Duncan during this year’s enshrinement ceremony on September 10, according to Hoophall.com. Isiah Thomas will be among five Hall of Famers to present Tim Hardaway.
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Celtics Prospect Juhann Begarin To Remain In France

August 15th, 2022 at 11:25am CST by Luke Adams

Celtics draft-and-stash prospect Juhann Begarin will remain with Paris Basketball for the 2022/23 season rather than coming stateside, according to Adam Himmelsbach of The Boston Globe (Twitter link).

A 6’5″ French shooting guard, Begarin was selected by Boston with the 45th overall pick of the 2021 draft. The 20-year-old, who has played for Paris since 2019, has yet to sign his first NBA contract — the Celtics have opted to allow him to continue developing overseas before they seriously consider adding him to their roster.

In 2021/22, which was Paris’ first season in France’s top league (LNB Pro A), Begarin averaged 11.1 PPG, 4.2 RPG, 1.5 APG, and 1.5 SPG in 29 contests (28.0 MPG). He has room to improve his shooting efficiency (.432/.309/.563), but made a strong impression as a 19-year-old playing a significant role.

Begarin has also played for the Celtics’ Summer League team in Las Vegas in each of the last two years and performed especially well last month, putting up 18.2 PPG and 5.6 RPG on .427/.333/.769 shooting in five games, all starts (31.1 MPG).

Begarin is one of two recent second-round picks the Celtics have stashed overseas. The other is 2020’s No. 47 overall selection, Yam Madar, who has played in Israel and Serbia since being drafted.

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Justin Hamilton Signs In Spain

August 14th, 2022 at 5:36pm CST by JD Shaw

Free agent center Justin Hamilton has signed a contract in Spain with Baxi Manresa, the team announced on Sunday (via Twitter). Hamilton spent the past five seasons playing in China.

Along with holding ample overseas experience, Hamilton has appeared in 113 NBA games. The No. 45 pick of the 2012 draft has spent time with the Hornets, Heat, Timberwolves and Nets.

The 7’0″ Hamilton played collegiately at Iowa State and LSU before declaring for the draft. He has also made international stops in Croatia and Latvia, plus a separate stint in Spain during the 2015/16 campaign.

Hamilton’s minutes and production in China gradually declined over time. Nevertheless, the 32-year-old averaged 12.4 points and 7.3 rebounds in eight games last season, along with 16.7 points and 7.0 rebounds in 35 contests the season before that.

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