2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup

International basketball competition

8 min read

The 2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup was the 19th tournament of the FIBA Basketball World Cup for men's national basketball teams, held from 25 August to 10 September 2023. The tournament was the second to feature 32 teams and was hosted by multiple nations for the first time in its history—the Philippines, Japan, and Indonesia.

It was the first World Cup to be hosted in Indonesia, and the second to be hosted in both the Philippines and Japan, both having first hosted the tournament in 1978 and 2006, respectively. The tournament was also the second of three-straight World Cups to be held in Asia after China's hosting of the 2019 edition and Qatar's upcoming hosting of the 2027 tournament, and the first time in tournament history that a host nation (Indonesia) had not qualified. It also served as qualification for the 2024 Summer Olympics, in which the top two teams from each of the Americas and Europe, and the top team from each of Africa, Asia and Oceania, qualified alongside the tournament's host France.

Germany went undefeated at the tournament to win their first title by defeating Serbia 83–77 in the final. It was the first appearance at the World Cup final for Germany, while for Serbia it would be its second in three tournaments, having appeared in the 2014 final. Canada went on to win the bronze medal, its first medal in World Cup history, after defeating the United States 127–118.

The tournament also set a record for the most-attended World Cup game in history, with 38,115 spectators attending the Dominican Republic vs. Philippines game at the Philippine Arena in Bocaue, breaking the previous one of 32,616 set during the 1994 final at the SkyDome in Toronto. Latvia, Georgia, Cape Verde and South Sudan all made their first World Cup appearances, with Latvia placing in the top five. Co-hosts Japan qualified for the Olympics by virtue of being the best-performing Asian team, while co-hosts Philippines qualified for the 2024 FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournament. Both co-hosts registered wins in the tournament.

The defending champions, Spain, lost to Latvia and Canada in the second round and finished only in ninth place. This was the first time Spain missed the quarter-finals since 1994. Olympic champions United States also failed to win a medal for the second consecutive tournament.

Host selection

On 7 June 2016, FIBA approved the bidding process for the 2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup.

Joint bids by member federations were also approved by the FIBA Central Board starting from the 2023 edition, and there is no restriction for a country from the confederation that hosted the previous edition to bid for the World Cup hosting rights.

On 1 June 2017, FIBA confirmed the list of candidates for the hosting of the World Cup.

Argentina / Uruguay
Philippines / Japan / Indonesia
Russia (withdrawn)
Turkey (withdrawn)

Solo bidders Russia and Turkey ended their bids, leaving joint bids of the Philippines–Japan–Indonesia, and Argentina–Uruguay left in the race, automatically marking the 2023 tournament as the first to be hosted by multiple nations.

Voting results

On 9 December 2017, it was announced that the Philippines, Japan, and Indonesia won the bid and will host the upcoming World Cup, after Argentina and Uruguay withdrew their joint-bid on the same day, leaving FIBA to award the hosting rights via a unanimous vote.

Teams

Qualification

As co-hosts, the Philippines and Japan each got an automatic qualification for the tournament when they were awarded joint hosting rights along with co-host Indonesia. However, Indonesia's host qualification slot was conditional, as FIBA wanted the Indonesian national team to be competitive by 2021 and thus required Indonesia to qualify for and finish in the top-eight (advance to the quarter-finals) of the 2022 FIBA Asia Cup (postponed from 2021). Indonesia officially qualified for the Asia Cup as host and advanced from the preliminary round-robin round, but lost to China in the playoff round (round of 16) and were therefore unable to secure qualification for their hoped-for FIBA Basketball World Cup debut. This was the first time in the FIBA Basketball World Cup history that a host nation did not qualify.

80 teams from four FIBA zones qualified for the World Cup qualifiers through qualification for the FIBA Continental Cups (AfroBasket 2021, 2022 FIBA AmeriCup, 2022 FIBA Asia Cup, and EuroBasket 2022). For Europe and the Americas, additional teams qualified through the pre-qualifiers of the said regions. The participants of both the AfroBasket and the Asia Cup comprised the teams that also took part in the qualifiers for their respective regions. The first game of the qualifiers took place in Minsk on 25 November 2021 between Belarus and Turkey, as part of the European Qualifiers. The draw for the World Cup qualifiers was held at the Patrick Baumann House of Basketball in Mies, Switzerland, on 31 August 2021.

The first round of the Americas, Asia/Oceania, and Africa qualifiers featured 16 teams each, whereas Europe had 32 teams. Division A teams were split into groups of four, to be held in a home-and-away round-robin. The top three teams in each group advanced to the second round. In round two of the World Cup qualifiers, teams were split into six groups, totaling four groups in Europe and two in the other qualifiers. Teams carried over the points from round one, and faced the other three teams again in a home-and-away round-robin. The best teams in each group qualified for the World Cup. No wild card selection was held, and the Olympic champions (United States) were not guaranteed a spot in the tournament.

The complete field of 32 teams that participated in the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023 was determined on 27 February 2023 at the conclusion of the sixth window of qualifiers.

Qualified teams

On 28 August 2022, Finland and the Ivory Coast became the first teams to qualify from Europe and Africa, respectively. The following day, New Zealand became the first Asian team outside of hosts Japan and the Philippines to qualify for the tournament. Finland made their second World Cup appearance after their debut at the 2014 edition in Spain. On 10 November 2022, Canada became the first team from the Americas to qualify.

Alongside Finland, Slovenia, Egypt, and Mexico returned to the World Cup since the 2014 edition after notably missing the 2019 tournament in China.

Lebanon returned to the World Cup after participating in the 2010 edition, while Latvia, South Sudan, and Georgia all made their FIBA Basketball World Cup debut. Cape Verde also qualified for their first World Cup, becoming the smallest nation in tournament history to qualify.

Brazil and the United States also secured qualification for the tournament, continuing their streaks of participating in all World Cups since its inception in 1950.

Days before the second window of the Asian Qualifiers, South Korea withdrew from the tournament due to one of its players, scheduled to join the team in its second window campaign, testing positive for COVID-19. The Korea Basketball Association made an appeal to FIBA to justify its non-appearance in the qualifiers but was rejected. As a result, South Korea failed to qualify for the World Cup after qualifying for two straight tournaments (2014 and 2019). Algeria withdrew from the tournament for similar reasons. Russia, who also participated in the 2019 World Cup, were banned from FIBA tournaments, including the World Cup and its qualifiers due to the country's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Belarus was also banned from FIBA tournaments and the past results of the games they played in the European Qualifiers were annulled. Mali were disqualified during qualifying by forfeiting two games.

After winning the silver medal at the 2019 World Cup in China and nine consecutive appearances dating back to 1986 in Spain, reigning FIBA AmeriCup champions Argentina failed to qualify for the tournament after their defeat to the Dominican Republic in the final window of qualification. Notable countries in Africa also failed to make the World Cup, including two-time reigning AfroBasket champions Tunisia, which made the last three World Cups prior to 2023 (2010, 2014, and 2019), Senegal, which qualified for the 2014 and 2019 editions, and Nigeria, who was the lone African nation to qualify for the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo.

The qualified teams, listed by region, with numbers in parentheses indicating final positions in the FIBA Men's World Ranking before the tournament were: