BUENOS AIRES (Argentina) - Argentina’s 22-man preliminary roster for the FIBA U19 Basketball World Cup 2019 will include a group of five foreign-based players including Francisco Caffaro, who spent this past season with the NCAA collegiate champions University of Virginia.

Caffaro was with Virginia but did not play for the Cavaliers this season as he sat out as a red shirt after a left leg injury. But Argentina head coach Maximiliano Seigorman will rely on his big man in Greece, where Argentina have been drawn into Group C with Greece, Philippines and Russia. Caffaro was second in scoring and first in rebounds for Argentina last summer at the FIBA U18 Americas Championship 2018, where the team finished third to qualify for their 13th U19 World Cup in 14 editions.

Caffaro is one of five players who ply their trade outside of Argentina. Also in the United States are Francisco Farabello from Texas Christian University and Thomas Notarainni, who goes to high school in San Diego and whose mother is Argentinian.

Leandro Bolmaro and Juan Francisco Fernández meanwhile are based in Spain with Barcelona and Fuenlabrada respectively. Neither played at the U18 Americas last summer, just like the Weber Bahia Basket duo of Tomas Chapero Juan Cruz Marini, who have played with the generation in past events, as have Ramiro Rattero, Ulises Sangoy and 2001-born Maximo Milovich.

Seigorman will call his troops together on May 25 in Bell Ville, Cordoba, moving to Las Varillas on June 1 and then heading to the the National Center of High Performance Athletics CeNARD in Buenos Aires from June 8-18 before traveling to Serbia for a tour which includes three friendlies.

FIBA