CHN - China next big victory in development push

PRAGUE (FIBA U19 World Championship) - The Chinese Basketball Federation has been pushing to develop a group of strong youngsters who booked another milestone victory at the 2013 FIBA U19 World Championship.

Shuai Yuan and Shang Gao combined for 13 three-pointers while star prospect center Qi Zhou collected 13 points, 17 rebounds and seven blocks and energetic and gritty playmaker Ji Wei Zhao put together 13 points, six assists and four rebounds in China's 88-79 victory over Australia in the Eight-Final Round in Prague.

The win pushed China's record to 3-1 in the second group stage - leaving them in third place behind the United States and Serbia with the tiebreaker advantage over 2-2 Australia and 1-3 Russia.

It all means that China are on the brink of qualifying for the Quarter-Finals, which would already be the Asian giants' best performance at the U19 World Championship - improving on their ninth-place showings in 1987 and 1995 - the latter with Wang ZhiZhi running the court.

The win over Australia shows that this group of Chinese is leading the country to unchartered waters - namely victories over previously unbeatable opponents for the nation.

China had lost all three previous match-ups against Australia in U19 World tournaments (in 1983, 1987 and 1991) and it was the first U19 Worlds victory over a non-Asian or African team since beating hosts Portugal in 1999.

One of the keys to this generation's development has been pushing them to play international tournaments against older generations. And it's produced positive results.

Zhou (1996-born), JW Zhao (1995-born) and Yi Feng Heng (1995-born) all played under-aged at last year's 2012 U18 Albert Schweitzer Tournament (AST) and the 2012 FIBA U17 World Championship.

At the AST, China beat European teams Greece, Denmark and Sweden while the Asians knocked off France, Czech Republic twice and Egypt at the U17 Worlds.

"This is wonderful, excellent. It's just like when we beat France last year," said JW Zhao after the win over Australia.

"Our federation is giving our young players a lot of chances to play international tournaments so we can get a lot of experience. And this helps us get better and feel more comfortable."

China has also been sending a team to the Nike International Junior Tournament (NIJT) Finals held at the Euroleague Final Four for the past three seasons. Three players from the current U19 team played for Team China at the NIJT finals in 2012 in Istanbul, including Qian Wu and Zhao Tianyi who also played in London in 2013.

"Those tournaments helped me open my eyes to help play against other great players from other countries," said Wu.

China actually pulled a major upset at the 2013 Euroleague NIJT tourney in London in May as they knocked off the storied Lithuanian side Lietuvos Rytas Vilnius 66-57. Six players from the U19 team in Prague were in London.

"That provided a big chance for our young players to see what it's like to beat a big European team," said Wu.

"Those players have a good belief that they can do their best and beat top teams," added JW Zhao, who was not on either of the NIJT teams.

China's U19 coach Huaiyu Wang said the improved results stem from the federation paying a lot of attention to and spending a lot of money on the youth players going abroad and taking part in international games or inviting foreign teams to China for different tournaments.

"This gives a lot of international game experience to the young players and they progress a lot through that," said Wang.

The win over Australia also has the long-term effect that Chinese players will now have already experienced beating the Aussies. This fact takes on bigger proportions when looking towards 2017 when Australia will play their World Championship and Olympic qualifiers with FIBA Asia teams as part of a Asia-Oceania zone.

"We beat Australia and that means the young players have a good sense and belief for the future that they can achieve a lot of good results," said the coach.

And the defeat to China was not lost on Australian head of delegation Nic Mercer.

"I think it will help us to get better because we're going to get pushed more often," said Mercer.

"The new system will give more games against a team that's continually pushing us. And today was another great example of that. They have some great talent coming up."

So, Chinese fans are already asking who their team knocks off next.

FIBA