REGENSBURG (David Hein's Eye on the Future) - "We are the Champions" has been played, the confetti has been cleaned up and the teams have all returned home. But let's take a look back at what we saw at the FIBA U16 European Championship 2016.

Spain return to the top

Spain celebrate their fourth U16 European Championship title.

Powered by the 14-year-old star talent and MVP Usman Garuba, Spain captured their fourth U16 title and first since 2013. Besides seeing that Garuba and Joel Parra are pretty darn good, the tournament in Radom, Poland showed that Spain continue to develop pretty high level talent – despite the on-going issue that the top Spanish clubs are bringing in more foreign-born players into their youth ranks. Carlos Alocen played at this spring's Jordan Brand Classic and also performed very strong in Poland, as did fellow point guard Didac Cuevas.

It will be important for those players to take the next step as they grow into the next age group. But Spain are not going anywhere at the U16 - having reached seven of the last eight Semi-Finals.

Lithuania come up just short again
Four points - that is the total points difference for Lithuania as the basketball powerhouses lost in the U16 Final for the second straight summer, and the second straight two-point loss. This time it was Spain in the Final - having lost to Bosnia and Herzegovina in the 2015 U16 title bout - and Carlos Unanue nailing a three-pointer with 10 seconds to decide the game for good - 74-72 for Spain. See the Top 10 plays of the tournament.

Lithuania played their usual game of sharing the ball and having different players step up. Four players registered games as the team's top scorer with those same four players - Tomas Balciunas, Dovydas Giedraitis, Domantas Vilys and Rokas Jokubaitis - all averaging between 10.0 and 12.3 points a game.

Turkey tripped up in Semis again
Turkey really didn't have a lot of pressure going into this summer's U16 European Championship even though Eray Akyuz is a heck of a player at point guard. But just like last year, Turkey took the third step on the podium opposite Lithuania with both nations watching a third group of players celebrate.

The Turks were tripped up by Lithuania in the 2015 U16 European Championship by two points with some highly touted young talents. This time around, Akyuz and Turkey could not get past Spain in the Semis but rebounded against Croatia to take third place for the second straight summer.

Bosnia make unpleasant history

BIH coach Dragan Micic couldn't find the answers for his team.

The difficult challenge of European youth basketball was witnessed at the U16 European Championship where reigning champions Bosnia and Herzegovina were relegated to Division B as they finished 14th. It was the first time in U16 history that the reigning champions were dropped to Division B the following summer. Two previous podium finishers went down the next year as Czech Republic were relegated in 2009 and 2013 after taking third place the summer previous.

The Bosnians had worked so hard to get up to Division A - booking their spot in 2013 with the likes of Nedim Djedovic. In 2014, Amar Gegic was the leader and Dzanan Musa played a year older and helped Bosnia stay in Division A. Then Musa, Sani Campara and Njegos Sikiras guided Bosnia to their first-ever international title - not to mention a hero's welcome of more than 50,000 people in Sarajevo.

What a difference a year makes as Musa and Co. were showing their stuff at the 2016 FIBA U17 World Championship and the 2000 generation  failed to get the job done - despite the presence of a couple of strong 2001-born talents. And now Bosnia are in Division B.

Russia coming back up

Russia wasted no time and earn promotion back to Division A.

Joining Bosnia in dropping to Division B for next summer are hosts Poland and Greece. Taking their place in Division A next summer will be the Division B winners Russia – who were dropped to Division B as result of the FIBA ban last summer; finalists Israel and third placed finishers Slovenia.

Croatian and French talent, Montenegro Division A across the board

Montenegro came into the U16 European Championship in good spirits and it was mission accomplished - stay in Division A.

Croatia lost in the Semi-Finals to Lithuania and then dropped the third place game to Turkey and finished fourth. But the Croatians continue to produce very high level talent. Luka Samanic was named to the All-Star Five and was widely considered the top player at the tournament. Croatia also featured Oton Jankovic, who has some high level skills as well.

France is another team that wowed observers with their individual talent. Of course Sekou Doumbouya - maybe the best 2000-born player in Europe - did not play in the tournament for Les Bleus. But France did have two future stars in Joel Ayayi and Theo Maledon.

One final note, 10 years after joining the FIBA family with all three youth teams starting in Division B, Montenegro grabbed eighth place to secure their spot in Division A next summer - just like their U18 and U20 teams, which both won their respective Division B tournaments this summer. It will be the first time in the nation's history that all three youth category national teams are lining up in Division A.

David Hein

FIBA

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