TOKYO (2015 FIBA Asia Championship) - Japan haven't played in a men's basketball tournament at an Olympic Games for four decades and not many experts will be giving them a chance of making it to next year's Rio de Janeiro Games.

But Japan will be an interesting team to follow at the FIBA Asia Championship in Changsha, China (23 September-3 October) and in the coming years because there are some intriguing players in the program.

One of them is Yuta Watanabe.

A member of the side that played at the 2013 FIBA Asia Championship in Manila when he was still only 19, Watanabe, a 2.01m small forward, averaged more than five points per contest in 8.5 minutes per game.

Two years on and he is not only bigger and stronger, but more experienced.

He has a year of American college basketball under his belt with the George Washington Colonials.

"I hope to show what I've learned in the [United] States here," Watanabe said to the Japan Times before he linked up with the Japanese squad at their training camp.

Watanabe had some good games with the Colonials, especially late in their 2014-15 campaign.

In a clash with Massachusetts in early March, he drilled seven of 10 shots from long range and finished with a season-high 21 points.

A couple of weeks later at Temple in Philadelphia, Watanabe had 15 points and connected on four of eight from long range.

He informed Japan coach Kenji Hasegawa before the summer that he was not going to be able to play with the national side for the entire training camp because of the need to take summer school classes at George Washington.

Other players to keep an eye on for Japan this summer are Yuki Togashi, a 21-year-old with experience in the NBDL with the Texas Legends, and Rui Hachimura, who shone for Japan at the 2014 FIBA U17 World Championship in Dubai.

We're going to enter the Olympic qualifying (for Rio) with long-term plans in mind. - Hasegawa

Hachimura, who is only 17, averaged almost 23 points per game for his country at last year's tournament in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Hasegawa has big aims for Japan, the host country of the 2020 Olympics.

But he is also realistic.

Since hosting and competing at the 2006 FIBA Basketball World Cup, Japan's best finish at a FIBA Asia Championship was seventh in 2011.

Their last appearance at an Olympic Games was 1976.

"We haven't been to an Olympics for 40 years, and we've got to set our goal based on that," Hasegawa said.

"We have the Tokyo Olympics in five years, and there’s the World Cup in 2019.

"We want to win a spot in the Asian and Oceania qualifying by ourselves [for the World Cup].

"There's 12 spots for the Olympics and 32 for the World Cup.

"Before we play in the Tokyo Games, we definitely want to play in the World Cup to test ourselves the year before.

FIBA