The World Cup starts on Friday 25 September (Italy-Angola tip-off will be at 10:00 Italian time) in three different countries, the Philippines, Japan, and Indonesia. Five players from the Olimpia 2023/24 team will be involved (Nicolò Melli, Pippo Ricci and Stefano Tonut play for Italy; Maodo Lo and Johannes Voigtmann for Germany) plus Gigi Datome, at his last dance as an active player, and Peppe Poeta as an assistant coach for the Italian team. Italy is located in group A of the competition, scheduled to be played in Manila, along the host team of the Philippines, Angola and the Dominican Republic.

OUTLOOK – The World Cup is open to 32 teams and every single place will be assigned at the end (basically none will go home immediately after the first phase) because the tournament also counts as qualification for the 2024 Olympics in Paris. The top-placed team from each continent will join hosts France along with the second-placed team from the Americas and the second-placed from Europe. The first 19 non-qualified teams will be admitted to the pre-Olympic tournaments (among them, however, there must be at least one African, one American, one Asian or Oceanic team).

THE FORMAT – The first two teams of each group will move to the second phase and will be mixed with the first two teams of another group, bringing along the result obtained during the first phase (the same happens to the third and fourth teams of each group for the assignment of places from 17th to 32nd). The first two of the groups of the second phase will access the knockout phase (quarters, semifinals, finals), as it will happen for the assignment of places from fifth to eighth, essential to get an Olympic berth. Basically, 24 national teams will leave the World Cup after September 3, while the others will stay to the end, scheduled for September 9 and 10.

ITALY – It is considered the favorite of its group, which however hides more pitfalls than it might seem at first sight. The first opponent, Angola, is historically the best prepared team in Africa even if it is going through a generational takeover and is very different from the team that played the 2019 World Cup. The Philippines team has home court advantage and a crazy following (basketball is the most popular sport over there) as well as one of the most talented players of the entire tournament, Jordan Clarkson (20.8 points and 4.4 assists per game in the NBA, with Utah, last season). After ten years, the Dominican Republic will have back its best player ever, Karl-Anthony Towns, a New Yorker by birth and basketball background, the first overall pick in 2015, who averaged 20.8 points and 8.1 rebounds per game at Minnesota during the last season. Italy, undefeated approaching the World Cup, is aiming to finish first. In the second phase, the first two classified in each group carry with them the result obtained against the other qualified team. Italy would cross Group B (Serbia without Nikola Jokic but with the return of Bogdan Bogdanovic of the Atlanta Hawks to the national team; China; Puerto Rico, clearly beaten in Ravenna; South Sudan, a rookie team coached by the American, Royal Ivey, and featuring the Lakers power forward Wenyen Gabriel and the G-League MVP, Carlik Jones, a point guard) for a new group that will qualify for the knockout phase (trying to look ahead, the most probable pairing would be with one among USA, Greece, and Lithuania). In the approaching phase to the World Cup, Tonut at the guard and Melli at center always started. Ricci has played big minutes as a back-up to Achille Polonara at power forward. Datome has been managed in terms of workload, but essentially, he is used off the bench behind Simone Fontecchio.

GERMANY – Its group is located in Okinawa, Japan, and includes Australia with seven NBA players including Josh Giddey of Oklahoma City, Josh Green of Dallas, Joe Ingles and Patty Mills; Finland with Lauri Markkanen, another more than 20-point per game scorer at Utah; and Japan which will not have Rui Hachimura of the Lakers but will have home court support and the sharpshooter Yuta Watanabe, a 44.4 percent three-point shooter in Brookleyn during the last season (now, he has signed for Phoenix). Germany makes its debut against Japan at 14:10 Italian time on Friday. In the following phase it would cross Slovenia (with Luka Doncic) or Georgia, Venezuela, or Cape Verde, featuring the Real Madrid intimidator Edy Tavares. Germany is coming off a European bronze medal on its home court and feature the Orlando Magic star Franz Wagner (18.6 points per game), his brother Mo, Dennis Schroeder (12.6 points per game for the Lakers), Dan Theis and a bunch of EuroLeague players (the two from Olimpia plus Andres Obst, Niels Giffey, Isaac Bonga, and Johannes Thiemann). During the preseason, it lost twice, once to the USA and once to Canada after an overtime but Germany had beaten the same opponent a few days earlier. Voigtmann has always started at the power forward position, Lo has always come off the bench but with significant minutes available.

THE OTHERS – The world and European defending champion of Spain is a mix of experienced (Sergio Llull, Rudy Fernandez, Victor Claver, the two Hernagomez) and emerging players, including Usman Garuba, coming from two years spent in the NBA, Santi Aldama who plays for Memphis, and Juan Nunez from Ulm (but he was raised in the Real Madrid academy). The United States have won all their friendly games, they are obviously the deepest but also the least experienced team. The average age is low and none of them has ever played in a national team competition. Minnesota forward Anthony Edwards has been the go-to guy for now, while the leader would appear to be Jalen Brunson of the New York Knicks. They are heavy favorite because of several factors including tradition, but they don’t have the usual star power. Slovenia is Luka Doncic’s team, with Mike Tobey as a naturalized player, so it’s very dangerous, because of all the big NBA players participating Doncic is the one with . Greece has a tricky group to contend with and is playing without Giannis Antetokounmpo, does not have Kostas Sloukas, but Thomas Walkup will step in as a naturalized player along some veterans such as Georgios Papagiannis, Kostas Papanikolau, Ioannis Papapetrou.

Despite numerous absences (Jamal Murray of the Denver Nuggets had to withdraw after attempting to join) Canada counts on a lot of NBA talent, from Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (he averaged 31.4 points per game in Oklahoma City) to RJ Barrett, Lu Dortz and Dillon Brooks. France, after finishing second in the last Olympics and in the last European Championships, is preparing to attempt an all-out assault to the gold medal in Paris 2024. It does not have the rising star Victor Wembanyama, but at center Rudy Gobert is one of the best in the NBA and in the world. The veteran Vincent Collet’s team has three NBA players and all the other nine are EuroLeague players. Lithuania, coached by Kazis Maksvytis, the Zalgiris head coach, has Jonas Valanciunas at center to make up for the absence of the Sacramento Kings’ star Domantas Sabonis. Latvia dominated the qualifying tournament but will be without Kristaps Porzingis. However, Coach Luca Banchi will still have Davis Bertans, Zalgiris shooting power forward Rolands Smits, and also two Italian league veterans, Andrejs Grazulis and Arturs Strautins. Georgia counts on Tornike Shengelia and Goga Bitadze in a very competitive front line. Looking from afar, the Jaharta group is the most dangerous, since only two teams will access the knock-out round among France, Spain and Canada. One of these three powerhouses will be relegated to compete for ninth place.