BERLIN (Germany) - Dennis Schroder has made it clear that he wants Germany's golden generation to keep playing for at least one more summer but hopefully longer.
The team has a new coach, with Spain's Alex Mumbru having replaced Gordie Herbert, yet Schroder is optimistic Germany can get back to the podium. Germany are attempting to qualify for FIBA EuroBasket 2025.
Herbert coached Germany to a third-place finish at EuroBasket 2022, a FIBA Basketball World Cup title in 2023 and a fourth-place finish at the Men's Olympic Basketball Tournament Paris 2024.
The good news for Germany is that Mumbru has a championship mentality.
"Our group is a golden generation, and it should stay together as long as possible"
As a player with Spain, he was a 2006 World Cup and EuroBasket 2009 winner, and a 2008 Olympic silver medalist. Now he's at the controls of a national team for the first time. And there is little debate about the potential of Germany.
"He (Mumbru) knows what he has in our team, how good we are as a group," Schroder said in an interview with the Braunschweiger Zeitung.
"He doesn't want to change everything, but he wants to try a few little things to get us into the right situation. It was also important to me that we make a few adjustments."
Schroder believes there are tournaments to be won with the current group of players.
"Our group is a golden generation, and it should stay together as long as possible," he said.
"Besides, otherwise we would have finished with two defeats in a row. (at the Olympics). And that can't really be the case, that's not how we wanted to approach things.
"In my view, we should have another summer together with the EuroBasket, after that there will be a year's break before the next World Cup, anyway."
Germany's fourth-place finish in France still burns Schroder.
The team went from the high of lifting the Naismith Trophy in Manila to four straight wins at the Olympics, only to then slip up against France in the Semi-finals, 73-69, and to Serbia in the Bronze Medal Game, 93-83. Schroder said after the Bronze Medal Game loss to Serbia that falling to France had taken the wind out of Germany's sails.
In the first meeting with France in Lille, Germany led by as many as 24 points before easing to a 85-71 triumph.
"German basketball future is bright," he said after that setback to Serbia on August 10. "The U18 team won the European Championship, Tristan da Silva just got to the League, (Isaiah) Hartenstein - we still got a lot of young guys who can play."
Indeed, Germany won the U18 EuroBasket after beating Serbia in the Final. Hartenstein, 26, plays for Oklahoma City.
In his post-Olympic interview, Schroder added: "Hopefully, my guys in the locker room, they'll all decide to come back and play. Because if I'm playing til 40, they can play until they are 37, 38 and make it special.
I love these guys
"I love these guys. As always, just to come to the national team is just the best thing ever, besides my family. Just coming to practice every single day, getting after it and at practice, we're screaming, we're trying to compete against each other. I never had an environment like that. Hopefully we can keep this going for a lot of years."
FIBA