
Indian basketball women can consider this time as a happy time. The Under-18 team will be a part of this year’s FIBA 3×3 U18 World Cup 2024 tournament. The tournament is scheduled to start from August 26-30 in Debrecen, Hungary. This serves as a welcome turnabout from the Indian women’s basketball team’s withdrawal from two continental championships in a row in the recent past.
The team has been assigned a seed of 11 and is in Pool C with the teams of Kyrgyzstan, Japan, China, and Uganda. Among these, Kyrgyzstan is seeded as the 3rd, Japan at the 6th place, China at the 14th spot, and Uganda at the 19th position.
Thus, the pool will be quite competitive, and the Indian team should bring its A-game if it wants to qualify for a quarterfinal berth.
In the championship, there are 20 teams in total: 10 in both the men’s and women’s divisions, respectively, and it is a format for four groups with five teams each. It is still a deep question,” Is basketball the #1 sport?” but the surge among fans is quite intense.
India Women’s U18 Basketball Team to Participate 3×3 World Cup 2024
The two teams in each group for the basketball game that start on the highest rank will progress to the quarterfinal stage.
India’s Game Schedule
Here is the schedule for India’s matches, with timings in Indian Standard Time (IST):
26 August, 10:15 pm: India vs China
27 August, 12:05 am: India vs Uganda
28 August, 9:30 am: India vs Kyrgyzstan
29 August, 1:05 am: India vs Japan
The tournament is set to air on the FIBA 3×3 YouTube channel, like before, so that the fans can follow all the action live.

Image Credit: sportskeeda.com/
A disappointment for the Indian men’s team
It is like getting two pieces of cake – the icing and the cake crust – all together for Indian women cricketers, but there is a tinge of sorrow for the Indian men cricketers.
Nevertheless the team was higher ranked and had the experience of recent victory, the Indian Men’s U18 failed to qualify for the Basketball World Cup this year. Many are shocked by this because the team has shown a relatively good performance in recent periods.
The India Men’s U18 has been performing quite well in the recent past; at the 2022 U17 Asia Cup, the team clinched the silver medal. This paved the way for their participation in this year’s world cup as this achievement had about created the impression.
The men’s team is ranked 47th on the global level and the 11th on the Asian level. The women’s team is 52th and the 14th on the Asian level. Nevertheless, only the women’s team will be able to play for India in Hungary.
In the men’s section of the World Cup, South Asia will be represented not by Pakistan but by Sri Lanka. This has, therefore, triggered debates and discussions within the Indian Basketball fraternity in relation to the selection process and criteria for selection into the national teams.
A Chance for Redemption
The involvement of the Indian Women’s U18 team in the World Cup is a good chance through which they can perform on the international scene. For some, this is their opportunity to get back to the games after missing the previous editions and maybe go for the gold.
3×3 is shorter in duration and more intense compared to the standard 5-a-side games; thus, the FIBA 3×3 U18 World Cup entangles talent with coordination together with strategy. Any Indian team will have to concentrate on these areas if it has to face some of the superior teams in the world.
Looking Ahead
During the tournament preparation, the fans and the players develop a level of expectation. The Indian women’s team has a steep cut out for them but if they assimilate the power of spirit, then they have the capabilities to perform in this tournament.
In any case, their appearance in the tournament is already a positive for Indian women’s basketball, and, as is usual, such advances should be used to encourage more young girls to take up the sport with dreams of competing globally.
The tournament will also prove beneficial for the players as they will get a taste of what it is like to play on a world stage and thus will be challenged enough to better themselves as footballers.
Therefore, having no Men’s team to support and watch is quite a loss. Still, we are now charged with the responsibility to support and encourage the participation of the Indian Women’s U18 team to face some of the premier teams globally. We only hope they are able to. The people of India will only hope that they are able to seize this opportunity and perform well on the international forums.
References:
1. www.sportskeeda.com/basketball
2. khelnow.com
3. thebridge.in
4. www.fiba.basketball
