It is the summer of Germany. Dirk Nowitzki last month entered the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, and on Sunday his homeland climbed to the top of the men’s international basketball world.
Tournament Most Valuable Player Dennis Schroder scored 28 points, Franz Wagner added 19 and Germany capped off an unbeaten run through the FIBA Basketball World Cup by holding off Serbia 83-77 in the final. It was Germany’s first World Cup title. Its previous top showing in the event was a bronze in Indianapolis, Indiana, in 2002.
Germany went 8-0 in the tournament, becoming the fifth consecutive World Cup champion to go unbeaten. Schroder’s postgame news conference was briefly interrupted by his teammates, who doused him with water as they jumped and chanted in celebration.
Photo: AFP
“It’s an unbelievable group,” Schroder said. “It’s unbelievable going 8-0.”
Germany coach Gordie Herbert took the job in 2021, and his first official order of business was driving to see Schroder. They spent three or four hours together that first day, building a relationship that is now good as gold.
“It’s a little bit of a surreal moment,” Herbert said. “It’s like I told the players. It’s a tremendous group of players, but we were a team first. Guys cared about each other and they challenged each other.”
Aleksa Avramovic scored 21 and Bogdan Bogdanovic added 17 for Serbia (6-2), which lost the title game for the second time in the past three tournaments. It was routed by the US 129-92 in the 2014 gold-medal game, and little was expected of the team this summer — merely because its best player, Nikola Jokic of the NBA champions Denver Nuggets, decided not to play and instead opted to rest for the coming season.
However, Serbia went on a surprise run, fueled by inspiration the team took from the loss of reserve forward Borisa Simanic. He was fouled late in a first-round win against South Sudan, needed surgery that night for internal injuries and then a second surgery was required a few days later to remove one of his kidneys.
Simanic got a medal, but it was silver, after Germany simply proved too tough.
“We made great success,” Avramovic said. “Our heads are up. This is already past, and our next goal is to go the Olympic Games and make better success than this. Germany, they have been playing amazing... We know that we made our country happy and put a smile on them.”
The notion of Germany being the world’s best in basketball was far-fetched even when Nowitzki was the country’s best player — but no more.
“In Germany, people are starting to recognize what we’re doing for our country,” Schroder said. “We want our respect as well.”
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