Youth Basketball Championship now features eight teams

Eight basketball youth teams from home and abroad will compete at the 2024 Shanghai Future Star Basketball Championship from August 6 to 11.

As the city’s self-developed sports competition, the championship debuted last year with six international teams.

This year, the number of the participating teams has been increased to eight. They are: Australian U18 Elite Team, Canada Honey Badgers, Utah Prep Academy from the US, Japan’s B League U18 Team, Igokea Basketball Academy from Serbia, Chinese U18 National Team, as well as two local teams Shanghai Sharks Junior Elite and Shanghai Youth United.

The eight teams are divided into two groups for round-up competitions. The top two teams from each group will then advance to the semi-finals and the final for the championship.

Future Star is a youth sport series introduced by Shanghai Sports Bureau after years of incubation, aiming to enhance communication between Chinese youth players and their international counterparts.

“For young Chinese players, this is also an opportunity to understand the gap between them and the outside world,” said Chinese Basketball Association vice president Xu Jicheng.

“The European and American basketball team are more competitive, and the main stream playing style has been changing,” he said. “We need to communicate more with the world, to learn from each other and make up for our shortcomings.”

During the event, the Shanghai Basketball Association will join with the basketball associations of neighboring Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Anhui provinces to organize a summit and a Yangtze River Delta Children’s Basketball Invitational Tournament.