{"id":84323,"date":"2024-07-03T06:00:48","date_gmt":"2024-07-03T10:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=84323"},"modified":"2024-07-03T00:40:01","modified_gmt":"2024-07-03T04:40:01","slug":"recapping-day-one-of-olympic-basketball-qualifiers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2024\/07\/03\/recapping-day-one-of-olympic-basketball-qualifiers\/","title":{"rendered":"Recapping Day One Of Olympic Basketball Qualifiers"},"content":{"rendered":"

The qualifying tournaments for the 2024 Olympics in Paris kicked off on Tuesday at four different sites. The tournaments will run from Tuesday through Sunday in Greece, Latvia, Spain, and Puerto Rico. Across the four OQT’s, 24 countries will battle it out for just four spots in the Olympics. The other eight spots have already been clinched due to the results of last summer’s<\/a> FIBA World Cup<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Recapping Day One Of Olympic Basketball Qualifiers<\/h2>\n

Piraeus, Greece<\/h3>\n

The Dominican Republic had a solid showing at the World Cup last summer, and now they want to follow that up with an upset in the Greece OQT. Beating Egypt 90-77 on day one is a good start. They were led by Jean Montero<\/a>, who had an impressive stat line of 17 points, 5 rebounds, and 4 assists. Chris Duarte<\/a> had 14 points and 6 rebounds, and longtime team veteran V\u00edctor Liz<\/a> had 12 points of his own. Egypt’s Ahmed Metwaly<\/a> led all scorers with 24 points, and Khaled Abdelgawad<\/a> had 15. Despite playing for the country for the first time in a decade last summer, Karl-Anthony Towns<\/a> is not playing for the Dominicans.<\/p>\n

The game from day one that most people will be focused on is the result of Slovenia vs. Croatia. The Slovenes are of course led by superstar Luka Don\u010di\u0107<\/a>. Unfortunately, he and the team got off to a really rough start. They got down by 15 points in the first quarter and shot an abysmal 2\/17 from three in the first half. That poor start from them is what gave Croatia the edge, and they went on to get the upset win 108-92 (and it was only that close after a nine-point fourth-quarter differential). The Croats did not qualify for the World Cup last year but are clearly very hungry to make up for that by making it to the Olympics this year.<\/p>\n

Each team had a player with a triple-double: Luka Don\u010di\u0107 for Slovenia and Dario \u0160ari\u0107<\/a> for Croatia. Triple-doubles are already really uncommon in international play, and for there to be two in the same game is crazy. Luka had 26 points, 11 rebounds, and 10 assists, while \u0160ari\u0107 had 19 points, 10 rebounds, and 10 assists.<\/p>\n

They weren’t the only high-level performers though. On the winning side, Clippers center<\/a> Ivica Zubac<\/a> had 18 points, 8 rebounds, and 5 assists. Goran Filipovi\u0107<\/a> actually led the team in scoring with 21 points, and he also had 4 rebounds and 6 assists. As a team, Croatia shot a nice 59.2% from the field. On the losing side, Klemen Prepeli\u010d<\/a> scored 19 points for Slovenia. Josh Nebo<\/a> added 12 points and 9 rebounds.<\/p>\n

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Super Mario to Super Ivica. \ud83c\udded\ud83c\uddf7<\/p>\n

Hrvatska on a roll \ud83d\udd25@mariohezonja<\/a> x @ivicazubac<\/a> #FIBAOQT<\/a><\/p>\n

\ud83d\udcfa https:\/\/t.co\/CqnNzbX9wb<\/a>
\n\ud83d\udcbb https:\/\/t.co\/7XnyzSmcc1<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/M1pxkcHaRD<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 FIBA (@FIBA) July 2, 2024<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n