Subject: Senior Canadian Basketball National Team

Thanks. Will be working on further deciphering tactics for next season.

This season's senior group includes:

Canada.................8
Iran..................10
Ukraine...............19
Bosnia & Hertzegovina.26
Norway................34


Looks like an easier group than last season.
Maybe we can save some energy for later rounds.

The 8 day injury sustained by our starting SF Brock Innis should not affect us too much. He will be back on the 8th of January for the game against Iran. He will miss a W/C game against Norway, and a friendly against the Czech Republic that he probably wouldn't have played in anyway. The upset loss to Ukraine should have little effect on our final group standing.

On to the next round which includes:

Slovakia......3
Lithuania.....6
Canada........9
France.......16
Romania......20
Germany......23
Worst two records are out.

We made it into the final 16 again this year. We will be facing the Netherlands first. A win there, and we would probably get Slovakia next. Not much hope against them, so we may try some off-the-wall tactics to encourage an upset if we get that far.

Looking like we might be in it until Innis and Baldwin fouled out. Still, a pretty good showing all things considered. Now prep for next season.

Season 25 first round grouping:

Slovakia........4
Canada.........10
Bulgaria.......22
Bosnia&Hertz...27
Greece.........36

Looking good again to move on to the next round.

After splitting home games with them in the preliminary round, we managed to win against Bulgaria 86-82, in the qualifying round, on their court, to advance to the final 16 round of play.
We will need even more smoke and mirrors to get past Hungary today and make it to the final 8.

Great showing. They were just Hungary-er in the round of 16 than we were I guess XD

They went on to take second place. Herein lies the rub. They had played exactly the same tactics for the previous three games, so I used tactics that would be appropriate. In those three games they were never behind at the half. In our game, we were ahead by three, and they evidently had provided for a change in tactics if they were behind at the half, but I had no idea the direction they would take. Ergo, I had no idea what adjustment to make. In fact, I was a little surprised we were actually ahead then. Had we been behind marginally going into the fourth quarter, we may actually have won !?! Their world ranking is a little better than ours, but I thought we might still have a chance. Lesson learned for next season.

Hard to make that prediction. Great job nonetheless.

Thanks.
Still working to unravel the tactics maze, both home and away. I have the basics. Just reviewing games between comparable teams to assess what works against what. World championships, especially in the playoffs are often a good source.

Canada....48
Hungary...49
Would have been an excellent win as they have a higher world ranking.
Instead it's just another one point loss in a very low scoring game!
Next game is a friendly.

Our 78-76 win over Sweden today pretty much guarantees us second place and a move on to the next round.

Big win over Latvia 85-80 improves our chances of moving on to the playoff round. Our top players played less than 10 min.