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European Basketball Championship at a glance

By Ben Bolch
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EUROPEAN BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP

When: Wednesday through Sept. 18

Where: Lithuania.

TV: ESPN2 will televise the championship game Sept. 18.

At Stake: Twenty-four teams are entered. The two teams that play for the championship are guaranteed berths in the 2012 Summer Olympics. Teams that finish third through sixth earn spots in another qualifying tournament.

Defending champion (2009): Spain.

Top NBA players: Germany: Dirk Nowitzki (Dallas) and Chris Kaman (Clippers); Spain: Pau Gasol (Lakers), Marc Gasol (Memphis), Serge Ibaka (Oklahoma City), Rudy Fernandez (Dallas) and Ricky Rubio (Minnesota); Italy: Andrea Bargnani (Toronto), Marco Belinelli (New Orleans) and Danilo Gallinari (Denver); Great Britain: Luol Deng (Chicago); Russia: Andrei Kirilenko (Utah); France: Tony Parker (San Antonio) and Joakim Noah (Chicago).

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Group breakdowns: Group A: Great Britain, Lithuania, Poland, Portugal, Spain and Turkey; Group B: France, Germany, Israel, Italy, Latvia and Serbia; Group C: Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Finland, Greece, Macedonia and Montenegro; Group D: Belgium, Bulgaria, Georgia, Russia, Slovenia, Ukraine.

Road to the championship: Three teams from each group advance to the knockout stage.

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Ben Bolch

Ben Bolch has been a Los Angeles Times staff writer since 1999. He is serving his second stint as the UCLA beat writer, which seems fitting since he has covered almost every sports beat except hockey and horse racing. Bolch is also the author of the recently released book “100 Things UCLA Fans Should Know & Do Before They Die.” He previously covered UCLA basketball from 2010-11 before going on to cover the NBA and the Clippers for five years. He happily traded in gobs of hotel points and airline miles to return to cover UCLA basketball and football in the summer of 2016. Bolch was once selected by NBA TV’s “The Starters” as the “Worst of the Week” after questioning their celebrity journalism-style questions at an NBA All-Star game and considers it one of his finer moments.

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