EuroBasket 1995
The 1995 FIBA European Championship, commonly called FIBA EuroBasket 1995, was the 29th FIBA EuroBasket regional basketball championship held by FIBA Europe, which also served as Europe qualifier for the 1996 Summer Olympics – Men's tournament|1996 Summer Olympics], giving a berth to each of the top four teams in the final standings. It was held in Greece between 21 June and 2 July 1995. Fourteen national teams entered the event under the auspices of FIBA Europe, the sport's regional governing body. The city of Athens hosted the tournament. Serbia and Montenegro men's national [basketball team|Serbia and Montenegro (then under the name of FR Yugoslavia)] won its first FIBA European title, by defeating Lithuania by the score of 96–90 in the final. Lithuania's Šarūnas Marčiulionis was voted the tournament's MVP. This edition of the FIBA EuroBasket tournament saw the successful return of the Lithuania national team to the competition, since its last triumph in 1939.
The tournament's official anthem was "Wings of Tomorrow" by Finnish band Stratovarius.
Venues
All games were played at the O.A.C.A. Olympic Indoor Hall in Athens.| O.A.C.A. Olympic Indoor Hall Capacity: 18,500 Opened in 1995 |
Qualification
| Competition | Date | Vacancies | Qualified |
| Host nation | – | 1 | |
| Champions from EuroBasket 1993 | 22 June – 4 July 1993 | 1 | |
| Qualified through Qualifying Round | 21 June 1993 – 16 November 1994 | 10 | |
| Qualified through Additional Qualifying Round | 31 May – 4 June 1995 | 2 | |
Format
- The teams were split in two groups of seven teams each. The top four teams from each group advance to the knockout quarterfinals.
- The winners in the semifinals compete for the European Championship, while the losers from the semifinals play a consolation game for the third place.
- The losers in the quarterfinals compete in a separate bracket to define 5th through 8th place in the final standings.
Knockout stage
Championship bracket
Quarterfinals
Winners qualified for the 1996 Summer Olympics.Final
From the start, the two teams matched up evenly, as Lithuania's Šarūnas Marčiulionis and Arvydas Sabonis and Yugoslavia's Aleksandar Đorđević and Predrag Danilović exchanged points. At halftime, the Lithuanians were ahead by a point, 49–48. Vlade Divac got a technical foul early in first half. In second half, an American referee George Toliver signaled Lithuanian center Arvydas Sabonis for a technical foul, which led to Lithuanian protestations.After a few more fouls signaled by the referee, one offensive and one technical against Lithuania, the Lithuanian team refused to return to the court after timeout. After a few minutes, Aleksandar Đorđević, who was the leading scorer with 41 points, tried to convince Marčiulionis to continue playing.
The persuasions were successful, and five Lithuanians returned to the court. Yugoslavia was leading 93–89 with 2 minutes remaining in the game. Players Arvydas Sabonis and Rimas Kurtinaitis could not return to the court, as they fouled out before the Lithuanian refusal to play. And although the Lithuanian team tried their hardest to catch up with the Yugoslavian team, they eventually lost 96–90.
After the Yugoslavs' victory, the Greek crowd that cheered against Yugoslavia throughout the final further showed their displeasure during the winners ceremony by chanting "Lithuania is the champion!". Furthermore, there was controversy during the medal ceremony as right before the winning Yugoslav team were about to receive their gold medals, the third-placed Croatian team, in an unprecedented move, stepped down from the medal podium and walked off the court in an unprecedented display of bad sportsmanship, due to the civil war in former Yugoslavia.
|1988