The annual William Jones Cup international basketball invitational tournament hosted by Taiwan is slated to tip off at Heping Basketball Gymnasium in Taipei next month after a three-year hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the national basketball governing body CTBA said on Wednesday.
At a news conference held for the tournament, association president Hsieh Tien-lin (謝典林) announced the return of the tournament, which is to have six female teams and nine male teams competing from Aug. 5 to 9 and from Aug. 12 to 20 respectively.
Last year, despite the Taiwan-based organization’s efforts, the tournament was ultimately canceled, because teams from other countries were unwilling to follow point-to-point movement restrictions and mandatory quarantine that was still compulsory in Taiwan at that time.
Photo: CNA
“Our players have not been able to play with teams from many countries for three years. I believe the experience will definitely help us in the [Hangzhou] Asian Games if our players and coaching staffers can learn a lot from the William Jones Cup,” said Sang Mao-sen (桑茂森), who coaches the Taiwanese men’s Blue team.
Each group in the tournament includes two teams from Taiwan, blue teams, consisting of the main roster of Taiwan’s national team, and white teams, made up of younger players who have the potential to represent the national team in the future.
Taiwan’s women are to square off against teams from South Korea, Japan, the Philippines and Iran, while Taiwan’s men are set to defend their home turf against South Korea, Japan, the Philippines, Qatar, Iran, the United Arab Emirates and the US, the association said.
Liu Cheng (劉錚), a 32-year-old veteran forward on the men’s blue team, said the group training of one to two months was not quite enough, but he promised to “lead by example.”
Also in the blue team is 23-year-old Benson Lin (林庭謙), whose first two outings in the tournament were in the white team.
Asked to comment on his mindset coming into the tournament, Lin said he expects to play a bigger role this year in the absence of Ray Chen (陳盈駿), who could miss the William Jones Cup due to an ankle operation.
Chen, 30, is a two-time Chinese Basketball Association (CBA) All-Star, who averaged 16.7 points and 7.3 assists per game for the Guangzhou Loong Lions in the 2022-2023 season and has agreed to a three-year extension with the CBA club last month.
Sang said whether Chen can play depends on how well he recovers, but the priority would be the Asian Games in late September.
Meanwhile, the men’s white team sees two new faces, Taiwanese-American brothers Adam Hinton and Robert Hinton, who play for Cornell University in the NCAA Division I in the US and have committed to Harvard University.
Tickets to the Taiwan-hosted tournament can be bought on ticketing platform ERA Ticket.
Held in Taiwan since 1977, the tournament was named after British basketball promoter Renato William Jones, the first secretary-general of the International Basketball Federation, the sport’s world-governing body, a post he held for 44 years from 1932.
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