Portugal national basketball team

Infobox national basketball team
country = Portugal
color1 = 990000
color2 = ffee00
coach = flagicon|Spain Moncho López
fiba_ranking = T-44^th
joined_fiba = 1932
fiba_zone = FIBA Europe
zone_championship = EuroBasket
national_fed = FPB
zone_appearances = 2
zone_medals = None
wc_appearances = None
wc_medals = None
a_body = 3D8E33 |a_pattern_b = _thinwhitesides |a_shorts = 3D8E33
h_body = ffffff |h_pattern_b = _thinblacksides |b_shorts = ffffff
oly_appearances= None
oly_medals = None

The Portugal national basketball team is the basketball side that represents Portugal in international competition. Portugal never achieved great success at international level, but his recent qualification and promising campaign at EuroBasket 2007 finals, seems to indicate their growing level.

Eurobasket 1935

Portugal nearly joined the field of the first European championship, but in the only qualification game held for the tournament the Portuguese lost 33-12 to the Spanish team in Madrid. The game was referred by the Spanish coach Mariano Manent.

Eurobasket 1951

Portugal's European Championship debut was at Eurobasket 1951 in Paris, where they were invited to play in the tournament. Both of their preliminary round games were losses, though they did get an official win in Romania's forfeit to finish 1-2 and third place in the group.

In the first classification round, Portugal managed a win against Switzerland in a major upset, 51-49, but nevertheless finished in fourth and last place of the classification round group with a 1-2 record. They then lost to Denmark in the second round classification 13-16 game, but defeated Scotland in the 15/16 game to place 15th of 18 teams.

EuroBasket 2007

Portugal qualified for its second EuroBasket (but first time through direct qualification) by finishing first in its qualification group, where it beat the likes of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Republic of Macedonia and Israel, who eventually booked the last place in the final tournament through an additional qualifying tournament.

In the preliminary round, Portugal lost its first two matches against Spain and Croatia by 56–82 and 68-90, respectively. Before the third and last match of its group, Portugal had to defeat Latvia by, at least, sixteen points; alternatively, a victory would suffice provided Croatia defeated the World champions, Spain, in their last match. Portugal won by only ten points, but since Croatia grabbed a surprising one-point victory, with a three-pointer in the last three seconds, Portugal qualified for the first time ever to the second round.

Portugal began this round playing against Russia, that had won all games in its preliminary group; the Portuguese were defeated by 65-78. Israel was the next opponent and, like in the qualification, Portugal once again defeated them, by 94-85, putting up their best performance in the tournament. This second victory revived Portugal's chances to reach the quarterfinals; a simple victory in the last match against the holders of the EuroBasket 2005 and 2006 FIBA World Championship runner-ups Greece would be enough, if Croatia defeated Russia (otherwise, Greece would have to lose by at least thirteen points). However, Greece displayed a consistent and stronger game play, beating naturally the Portuguese by 67-85 and ending their qualification hopes.

Nevertheless, it was the best performance ever by a Portuguese national basketball team at this level, ensuring a spot in the twelve best European teams.

Roster

Team that represented Portugal in the EuroBasket 2007, their best classification ever.

Coach: flagicon|UKR Valentin Melnychuk

Notable Players

* Tó Ferreira
* Carlos Lisboa
* Pedro Miguel
* Nuno Marçal
* Pedro Nuno
* Rui Pinheiro
* Mike Plowden
* Steve Rocha