And yet Team USA is threatened with exclusion from the 2023 World Cup

It counts… Moments before losing the top spot in world basketball to Spain for the first time in FIBA ​​rankings history, the US national team is under pressure as it looks to qualify for the 2023 World Cup.

The Americans were defeated 79-94 in Washington by Brazil (Camboclo 24 points, 4 rebounds, De Paula 18 points, 5 rebounds, Benite 11 points) and missed an opportunity to check their tickets now for next summer’s tournament and themselves thus giving the right to groups that are pursuing them to challenge them.

With three games to go, USA are 7-2 in the second qualifying round, followed by Mexico and Brazil 6-3. Uruguay and Puerto Rico follow 5-4 with five teams battling for the top three spots. It’s just that the Americans have a tough schedule as they will first host back-to-back Colombia (3-6) and then travel to Uruguay and Brazil where there could be finals matches.

With head coach Jim Boylen not having any active NBA players but non-league players like Chris Chiozza, Alize Johnson, Langston Galloway, Henry Sims and Rodney Hood, no one can assume that the US will reach the goal of qualifying for the NBA World Cup 2023. A win against Colombia secures qualification, otherwise the schedule is tough and two losses against Uruguay and Brazil put them in great danger.

If the USA lose to the Columbia of Brian Angola, Andres Ibarguen and Michael Jackson then they will be in a really difficult position as a 7-5 record could knock them out of the top 3 and out of the top 4. You see, in the opposite group, the Dominican Republic and Argentina sit 3rd and 4th respectively with six wins, one more than Uruguay and Puerto Rico in Team USA’s group.

Simply put, the possibility of the US national team failing at the 2023 World Cup is remote to unlikely and extreme, but it is there, especially if Colombia defeats the Americans in the fourth game of the second phase.