Canada Basketball announces training camp roster for Junior Men’s National Team

Canada Basketball has announced the 13 athletes who will participate in training camp and compete for a spot on the Junior Men’s National Team (JMNT) roster. This summer, the team will compete in the 2011 FIBA U19 World Championship for Men in Latvia.
 

Training camp for the JMNT will be held from June 18 – 22 at the University of Toronto’s Athletic Centre and the practice facility of the Air Canada Centre in Toronto, Ontario. Following training camp, the JMNT will participate in the International Youth Global Games tournament in Lithuania as a tune up tournament for the World Championship. Games will be hosted in Panevezys, Lithuania, from June 25 – 27, where Canada will play Latvia on June 25, Australia on June 26 and Brazil on June 27.

Game summaries will be posted on http://www.basketball.ca. 

The JMNT is one of 16 teams to qualify for the FIBA U19 World Championship. The JMNT will face tough competition in the preliminary round as they have been assigned to Group B, which includes Croatia, Lithuania and Korea.

Canada qualified for the FIBA U19 World Championship by claiming the bronze medal last summer at the 2010 FIBA Americas U18 Championship for Men in San Antonio, Texas. They used a last second 3-pointer by Kyle Wiltjer (Portland, OR) in overtime to defeat Argentina to win bronze.

In the last FIBA U19 World Championship in Auckland, New Zealand in 2009, Cory Joseph (Ajax, ON), Tristan Thompson (Brampton, ON) and Kelly Olynyk (Kamloops, BC) led Canada to a 7^th place finish. Overall, this will be Canada’s seventh trip to the tournament, and tenth time that FIBA will host a competition for this age group. Canada’s highest finish was 6^th in 1987 in Bormio, Italy.

The training camp roster does not fall short of international experience, as it includes 9 players who represented Canada as part of last summer’s National Team Program. Attending camp are Kevin Pangos (Holland Landing, ON), Negus Webster-Chan (Scarborough, ON) and Dyshawn Pierre (Whitby, ON) who were three players that helped guide Canada to the bronze medal at the 2010 FIBA U17 World Championship, where Pangos was named the top point guard of the tournament and Pierre ranked fourth in rebounding. Pangos and Pierre enjoyed successful high school seasons as Pierre won the AAA OFSAA gold medal for Anderson CVI defeating Pangos’ Dr. Denison High School.

Attached are the JMNT training camp details and the preliminary round schedule for the 2011 FIBA U19 World Championship.

For more information on Team Canada and the 2011 FIBA U19 World Championship, please visit http://basketball.ca or http://latvia20