Basketball celebrates 80 years at the Olympics in the 2016 edition and the Rio Olympics sees 12 teams each in both the Men’s and Women’s categories. Matches tip off on 6 August and end on 20 and 21 August with both the gold medal and bronze medal matches taking place on the final day.
Olympics Basketball Tournament Format
The 12 teams are divided into two groups of six teams each. Each team plays the other five countries once in the group stage. A win gives the country two points while a loss is also awarded a point.
After all teams have played five matches, the top four teams from each group go into the knockout stages. The teams are classified based on points won but if two teams finish on the same points then the head-to-head result decides which team finishes higher. If two more teams are still tied at this stage then the Points Difference comes into play and lastly the Points Scored if it comes to that.
where they enter the quarter-finals and play teams from the other group depending on where they finished in the table. The higher a team finishes in one group, the better their chances of facing a weaker team that qualified from the other group.
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Countries competing in 2016 Olympics Basketball
With 12 slots available at the Olympics, they go to teams that have won titles in the qualification tournaments. Brazil automatically qualified as the host nations while the rest of the 11 teams have come through a rigorous qualification process.
Olympic hosts were not always guaranteed an automatic berth in the Olympics. But a ruling in 2015 by FIBA's Central Board saw Brazil granted automatic qualification because “Brazil Basketball Confederation (CBB)'s application confirmed they met the various sporting requirements, including having a rich sporting history in basketball and being able to guarantee their best teams competing in Rio.”
The United States qualified after they won the 2014 FIBA Basketball World Cup. The winners of the various continental tournaments were Australia, Nigeria, Venezuela, Spain and China. Europe and the Americas have two slots so runners-up Argentina and Lithuania also qualify. The final three teams – Serbia, France and Croatia – qualified through various Olympic Qualifying Tournaments that were held in July.
| GROUP A | GROUP B |
|---|---|
| France | Argentina |
| USA | Spain |
| Venezuela | Brazil |
| Serbia | Lithuania |
| China | Croatia |
| Australia | Nigeria |
The United States Women’s team also qualified after they won the 2014 FIBA World Championship. But their qualifying format is a bit different compared to the Men’s. Runners-up from the continental tournaments do not qualify but five teams qualified through Olympic Qualifying Tournaments. Of course, Brazil automatically qualified as the hosts.
The continental winners were Serbia, Canada, Australia, Japan and Senegal. The teams that qualified through the qualifying tournaments were Belarus, China, France, Spain and Turkey.
| GROUP A | GROUP B |
|---|---|
| France | Canada |
| Japan | Spain |
| Brazil | USA |
| Australia | Senegal |
| Belarus | Serbia |
| Turkey | China |
More: 5 greatest basketball teams in Olympic history
Olympics Basketball Venue
All basketball matches at the 2016 Olympics will be held at the Carioca Arena 1 in the Barra Olympic Park in Rio. The stadium has a capacity of 16,000. The venue will also host wheelchair basketball and wheelchair rugby at the 2016 Summer Paralympics in September.
