North Macedonia, Poland, Portugal join field for FIBA EuroBasket 2025 Qualifiers
MUNICH (Germany) - North Macedonia, Poland and Portugal locked up their spots in the FIBA EuroBasket 2025 Qualifiers by winning their respective groups in the Second Round of the Pre-Qualifiers.
Those three nations as well as EuroBasket 2025 co-hosts Cyprus join the 24 teams who reached the Second Round of the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023 European Qualifiers. There are still four slots up for grabs and those will be determined in the Third Round of the EuroBasket Pre-Qualifiers.
The eight teams that did not advance to the Qualifiers via the Second Round - Austria, Bulgaria Croatia, Denmark, Norway, Romania, Slovakia and Switzerland - will join four teams from the First Round - Albania, Ireland, Kosovo and Luxembourg - in the Third Round.
The final games will be played from July 19 to August 5 in round robin format.
Group F
12/12 games played
| GAMES | GAME POINTS | POINTS | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| # | Team | P | W | L | % | For | Agt | +/- | FA | AA | |
| 1 |  Portugal |
6 | 5 | 1 | 83.3 | 514 | 424 | 90 | 85.7 | 70.7 | 11 |
| 2 |  Bulgaria |
6 | 5 | 1 | 83.3 | 477 | 424 | 53 | 79.5 | 70.7 | 11 |
| 3 |  Romania |
6 | 2 | 4 | 33.3 | 398 | 428 | -30 | 66.3 | 71.3 | 8 |
| 4 |  Cyprus |
6 | 0 | 6 | 0 | 371 | 484 | -113 | 61.8 | 80.7 | 6 |
The biggest drama on the final game day came in Group F where the top two teams were facing off and hosts Bulgaria knew it needed to win by 11 points to overtake Portugal. Led by star forward Aleksandar Vezenkov's 30 points, Bulgaria took over the game in the second half but they could only muster a 90-82 win to come up just short. Chavdar Kostov added 19 points in the win while Travante Williams poured in 21 points for the advancing Portuguese.
Aleksandar Vezenkov's contributions weren't enough for Bulgaria
In the other Group F game, Romania beat EuroBasket 2025 co-hosts Cyprus 75-50 to improve to 2-4. Patrick Richard had 15 points for the winners.
Group D
12/12 games played
| GAMES | GAME POINTS | POINTS | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| # | Team | P | W | L | % | For | Agt | +/- | FA | AA | |
| 1 |  North Macedonia |
6 | 5 | 1 | 83.3 | 436 | 375 | 61 | 72.7 | 62.5 | 11 |
| 2 |  Slovakia |
6 | 4 | 2 | 66.7 | 439 | 436 | 3 | 73.2 | 72.7 | 10 |
| 3 |  Norway |
6 | 2 | 4 | 33.3 | 380 | 417 | -37 | 63.3 | 69.5 | 8 |
| 4 |  Denmark |
6 | 1 | 5 | 16.7 | 426 | 453 | -27 | 71 | 75.5 | 7 |
North Macedonia knew they needed a victory to advance from Group D and they wasted little time and dominated Norway 79-41. T.J. Shorts collected 22 points, 6 rebounds and 5 assists and Vojdan Stojanovski chipped in 16 points in the win, which pushed North Macedonia to 5-1.
T.J. Shorts helped North Macedonia lock up a spot in the Qualifiers
Slovakia did their part to put the pressure on North Macedonia by defeating Denmark 72-71 to improve to 4-2. Simon Krajcovic made two free throws with 21 seconds to decide the game. Vladimir Brodziansky totalled 29 points and 7 rebounds and Krajcovic finished with 18 points in the win.
Group E
12/12 games played
| GAMES | GAME POINTS | POINTS | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| # | Team | P | W | L | % | For | Agt | +/- | FA | AA | |
| 1 |  Poland |
6 | 5 | 1 | 83.3 | 493 | 412 | 81 | 82.2 | 68.7 | 11 |
| 2 |  Croatia |
6 | 5 | 1 | 83.3 | 483 | 414 | 69 | 80.5 | 69 | 11 |
| 3 |  Switzerland |
6 | 2 | 4 | 33.3 | 392 | 436 | -44 | 65.3 | 72.7 | 8 |
| 4 |  Austria |
6 | 0 | 6 | 0 | 405 | 511 | -106 | 67.5 | 85.2 | 6 |
In Group E, Poland took care of business as they pulled away from Switzerland 80-70 thanks to some good fourth quarter defense. Aleksander Balcerowski could not be stopped with 31 points and 9 rebounds for Poland and Mateusz Ponitka chipped in 8 points, 7 rebounds, 14 assists and 3 steals for the FIBA EuroBasket 2022 Semi-Finals team, which finished at 5-1.
Mateusz Ponitka dished out 14 dimes on the road
Croatia will have to go through the Third Round to reach the EuroBasket Qualifiers as their 84-74 victory over Austria moved them to 5-1 as well but it was not enough. Goran Filipovic paced the winners with 17 points.
FIBA
