Israel qualifies for Eurobasket 2009!

With three straight losses to Bosnia, Great Britain, and the Czech Republic, it looked like Israel was going to miss playing in Eurobasket next summer. The best Israel could've hoped for was a chance to make next year's tournament through the final qualification round where it would have to place first of eight teams in order to clinch the 16th spot in the European Championships.

That situation just improved exponentially after beating the Czech by a resounding 37 points as Turkey defeated France by two points. The victory officially put Israel in seventh place, allowing it to scrape into Eurobasket.

It's very obvious that playing in Tel Aviv has given Israel a huge advantage this summer and playing at the Nokia Arena again played a large factor in the blowout. Israel was undefeated with a 20-point margin against opponents at home.

Here are the other teams that qualified for next summer.

Poland (host nation)
Lithuania, Russia, Spain (Olympic qualification)
Croatia, Germany, Greece, Slovenia (Olympic qualifying tournament)
Great Britain, Macedonia, Serbia, Turkey (first place in Eurobasket qualification pools)
Latvia, Bulgaria (finished in top seven of Eurobasket qualification)

Israel is going to have to become a much better team if it expects to make the World Championships next summer. The top 10 teams from this tournament should make the World Championships in 2010. Turkey will automatically qualify as it is the host nation.

Lithuania, Russia, Spain, Croatia, Greece, and Great Britain should all make it unless one of them has a major collapse. Germany should make it if Dirk Nowitzki decides to play. Slovenia and Serbia are good enough to make it, but they aren't locks while France will make this list next year and also be very good.

If Israel expects to make the tournament, it will have to finish ahead of either Germany or Slovenia. The road woes simply aren't going to cut it for Israel next summer and considering the team will have three NBA prospects, there's no reason for it to miss the World Championships next summer.