Albert Schweitzer Tournament

The German team after winning the title in 2018

The eventual MVP of the tournament Jonas Mattisseck on the ball in the final against Australia 2018

The Albert Schweitzer Tournament (AST) is a competition for national basketball teams of male youth that takes place every two years in Mannheim . The tournament is considered an unofficial world championship for the U18 age group. The organizers are the German Basketball Association and the City of Mannheim.

The US Army was also the organizer until 2010 ; the traditional venue was the US Sports Arena on the grounds of the United States military base in Mannheim. Since 2006 some of the games have been taking place in the MWS hall at Herzogenried . After the withdrawal of the Americans, the MWS-Halle, now renamed GBG-Halle due to a change of sponsors, has been the central venue since 2012, some of the games take place in Viernheim . Viernheim has also been the official co-organizer of the tournament since 2014.

history

All 12 participating nations at the 2018 closing ceremony

The initiators of the first Albert Schweitzer tournament, which was held in December 1958 with eight teams and won by Belgium, were the photographer Hans-Joachim Babies and the German basketball pioneer Hermann Niebuhr , who won the name of the Protestant theologian and doctor Albert Schweitzer . The second AST took place in the following year, after which there was a break until 1966. From this point on, the two-year cycle established itself. In 1991 the AST had to be canceled due to the Second Gulf War. The plan to make up for the 1992 tournament was not implemented in order to keep to the two-year cycle. From 1994 the AST took place in even years. This brought it into line with the calendar of the World Basketball Federation FIBA .

The Albert Schweitzer Tournament is an invitation-only tournament in which not all applications for the now 16 starting places can be considered. According to the German Basketball Federation, the event developed into "the largest and best-attended basketball tournament in the world for U18 juniors", especially after 2010. The record winners are the USA with ten titles so far, followed by Italy with four and Yugoslavia with three wins.

The winner of the 25th Albert Schweitzer tournament, which took place from April 3 to 10, 2010, was Australia, which beat Germany in the final with 68:51 and celebrated its first tournament victory. For Germany, too, the second place at that time meant the best result at the AST. With 28,763 spectators, the attendance record of 2008 was only just missed.

In 2016, Germany achieved its first tournament victory in the 28th edition of the AST. In the final, the team prevailed against Serbia with 70:65. In the following event two years later, the host team repeated their triumph and defeated Australia in the final with 88:66.

For the 30th staging of the tournament in 2020, no team from the United States registered for the first time, as the date according to the German Basketball Federation was not suitable for "sending an official USA national team". However, the US selections that took part in the tournament in previous years were not compiled by the US federation and were therefore not like the US national teams that competed in the youth field at World and American Championships. Many of the best US players of each year therefore did not take part in the Albert Schweitzer tournament. In mid-March 2020, the 2020 tournament was canceled by the German Basketball Association due to the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus . At the beginning of June 2020, it was announced that the tournament would be made up for in 2021 and then held every two years in the odd years.

meaning

The Albert Schweitzer tournament is an important date for basketball professionals from all over the world, because some of the greatest talents of the respective age group meet here. Well-known names who took part in the AST and later played in the North American NBA included Magic Johnson , BJ Armstrong , Dirk Nowitzki , Tim Duncan , Vince Carter , Arvydas Sabonis , Dino Rađa , Dražen Petrović , Hidayet Türkoğlu , Darius Songaila , Mehmet Okur , Pau Gasol and Toni Kukoč . Other well-known AST participants were Antonello Riva , Valeri Tichonenko and Igors Miglinieks .

In the 2000s and 2010s, later NBA players such as the French Tony Parker , Boris Diaw , Ronny Turiaf , the Russian Wiktor Chrjapa , the American Eddie Griffin (all in the tournament in 2000), the Australian Andrew Bogut (in the Tournament 2002), the Turkish Ersan İlyasova , Kyle Lowry from the USA, the Chinese Yi Jianli (both 2004) the French Nicolas Batum (awarded as the best player of the 2006 tournament), the Israeli Omri Casspi (also in 2006), the Turkish Enes Kanter , the Australian Matthew Dellavedova (both participating in 2008), the Croatian Dario Šarić , the French Evan Fournier and the German Daniel Theis (all participating in 2010), the Turk Cedi Osman , the Spaniard Willy Hernangómez (both participating in 2012) to the AST . In 2014, players like Furkan Korkmaz (Turkey), Marc Garcia (Spain), Ludvig Hakanson (Sweden) and Ethan Happ (USA) took part, who also made a name for themselves a few years later in the adult field on an international level.