South Sudan moves up several spots as Rwanda drops in the latest FIBA World Ranking.
Since October 2017, FIBA has changed the way it ranks national teams, converting from the previous competition-based system to a game-based system. Today, the FIBA World Ranking has been released after the November window of the FIBA Continental Cup Qualifiers and South Sudan’s Bright Stars top the climbers worldwide.
In the rankings released this Wednesday, December 9, 2020, there has been little change for the current World Basketball top teams, only Russia climbed two spots from 11th to enter into the top 10 and got the 9th place. In Africa, there were no major changes too with Nigeria still on the top followed by Angola, Tunisia, Senegal, and Cote d’Ivoire respectively.
In the East African Region, teams like Uganda, Kenya, and South Sudan are among the climbers while Rwanda, after a poor run of results in the Group D qualifiers games played in Kigali plunges four spots.
South Sudan led by legend Luol Deng as federation president and head coach, won two games in the previously concluded Afrobasket Qualifiers window 1 to rise from 107th to 98th place. This makes the Bright Stars the best climbers in this ranking. Kenya Morans and Uganda Silverbacks have also moved forward after their impressive performances in these Qualifiers.
Despite having failed to win a single game in the qualifiers that had been played at their home arena in Kigali, Rwanda is still ranked first in East Africa. Uganda is second, South Sudan third place and fourth is Kenya followed by Burundi in fifth place.
With this new system, every game played by a national team within the last eight years in the World Cup, Olympics, continental championships, and qualifiers for these events is included in the calculations.
South Sudan, Kenya, Uganda, and Rwanda will be back in action in February 2021 playing Afrobasket Qualifiers window 2 where we can expect the new ranking for the men’s category. Uganda Silverbacks will rest until next week then resume non-residential training on December 15. On the other hand, Rwanda Basketball Federation with the Ministry of Sports is still in the process of replacing the resigned head coach in the last week.
Click here to view the full FIBA World Ranking Men, powered by Nike.
