From the streets to the Olympics, literally
Great 3x3 basketball stories available to anyone on YouTube. This week only World Tour related section is not totally surprising, even for us. Enjoy!
Intro
Fourth edition is like a 4-point shot made in BIG3, and we feel exactly like this - happy and grateful to be able to write to you every week.
Thanks to all readers, especially subscribers! If you appreciate our work, please share our publication. Remember, we are on X too, and our FB group awaits your input!
First movie poster featuring 3x3 basketball team ever created. A good one, don’t you think?
Interesting facts about 3x3 basketball
This section today is probably most interesting to the students - you can watch the movie, play in tournament during summer break or schedule your summer internship in sunny Italy ;)
Better than Netflix
Do you like basketball movies? We love them! And what about 3x3 basketball productions?
2 weeks ago we wrote about “Gold is better” and you liked it, so let’s continue on the topic. There is a movie about historical, first Olympic gold medal team, too:
And another, about the team, which never won Olympic gold, despite they fully deserved it:
Both shows the real grassroots and soul of streetball, the reasons why we all like 3x3 basketball so much. Enjoy! (English subtitles are of course available).
3x3 basketball communities around the world
Playing 3x3 becomes more and more popular, also among students. Here is the rare opportunity to play (if you can) or participate (if you want) in European Universities 3x3 Basketball Championship 2025.
Who wants to spent beginning of August in sunny Salerno (Italy)?
Register the team here. You can also apply as a volunteer, to help organise the whole championship, learn how such kind of events works from the backstage and get some extra points to your CV.
BIG3
Another recognisable (to say least) NBA player decided to move his talents to Ice Cube’s league. Do you remember Born Ready?
Also season 8 draft event will take place… today. Expect our summary next week.
FIBA 3x3 World Tour
Hongcheon Challenger was the only and main event past week, played unusually inside, but still pretty interesting.
Week summary
We must admit, that there were two teams we underappreciated at the beginning of 2025 season: Raudondvaris and Riffa. Apologies, especially to Mr Donkor! Both of them show strength and consistency at the beginning of current World Tour, and both of them were pretty close from winning the most important tournament last weekend. And… the both lost to Hangzhou team (officially playing as Chinese team, without Chinese players in the roster):
First, in semifinal, playing without Vidovic, they dismantled Belgians:
And later on, in a final game, they beat Lithuanians (four players, but no Pukelis - it changes a lot):
Let’s see what Hangzhou will show this weekend in Amsterdam Masters…
#3x3PowerRanking
TOP16 teams in the world, in our opinion. Since the previous one, one team was added.
Format: position, team, position change, current FIBA3x3 ranking (May 14th 2025), reason. This week was pretty quiet, so we comment the changes only.
Amsterdam, -, 2,
Miami, -, 3.
Toulouse, -, 4.
Raudondvaris, -, 5.
UB, -, 1.
Riffa, +1, 7, seems we underestimated Dennis Donkor a little bit.
Liman, -1, 8, only one win in Korea.
Hangzhou, +3, 14, winners of Hongcheon Challenger!
Vienna, -1, 6, haven’t play this week.
Partizan, -1, 9, took a break.
Chongming, -1, 11, resting.
Lausanne, -, 12.
Ulaanbaatar, -, 13.
Shinagawa, -, 22.
London, -, 10.
Utrecht, new, 15, 4th place in Korea.
Predictions
Three super interesting tournaments are scheduled for this weekend, ladies first:
Women’s Series in Amsterdam - it would be crazy to not assume that the host team is going to win it all. But Mongolian, Chinese and Australian teams have similar plan… and this is our top 4.
Amsterdam Masters - first tournament won by Olympics winners? Why not? Beside them, Miami, Riffa and Toulouse should be present in semifinals we think.
Xi’an Challenger - Shanghai and Phoenix are teams to watch carefully, and Partizan is the team to beat.
3x3 basketball national teams
Three news from three continents (America, Asia and Europe) - classical 3x3.
Congratulations to the new USA 3x3 basketball champions!
Michael Jordan in NBC. So what? You better read an interview with Jimmer Fredette! And yes, he openly admitted:
Our USA Basketball player pool is pretty small right now.
That’s why it is worth to watch the Phoenix team mentioned above even more. One of the players playing in Xi’an is Max Murrells, who also has something to say about his new 3x3 adventure.
FIBA 3x3 World Cup 2025 qualifier
Last three men's and women's tickets left for the biggest event of the national 3x3 basketball season. FIBA announced the pools for the qualifier being played in Ulaanbaatar (Mongolia) end of June.
Who is going to take them? Montenegro, Canada and Great Britain men teams and Chinese Taipei, Azerbaijan are our bets. At least right now, until the rosters are known…
Italy took 3x3 basketball seriously, finally
Amadeo Della Valle, former captain of the senior national team, announced his return to the Azzurri jersey, but this time he will play 3x3!
It is definitely a great news for Italy men national team, currently ranked 25th in FIBA3x3 ranking. He definitely knows what basketball is about:
Have great weekend, full of 3x3 basketball, take care!