Everything you need to know about the first Qualifiers window

MUNICH (Germany) - The first window of the FIBA Women's EuroBasket 2021 Qualifiers is upon us as the race to make Final Round gets underway.

Here's our handy guide, with everything you need to know for these first two crunch game days.

14 is the magic number

There are 33 teams competing for a ticket to Final Round and all that matters to every nation is that they finish as one of the 14 who will advance. The nine group winners and five best-placed runners-up will all proceed to Final Round. This window is the first of three, with the second taking place in November 2020 and the last in February 2021.

Breathing fire

There are some players who head into this window in top gear and are lighting it up. Leading the way is Alina Iagupova of Ukraine, who has already taken two weekly Top Performer honors in EuroLeague Women and has hit the ground running since her summer move to Fenerbahce. She will remain the heartbeat for her country, who are looking to bounce back from a disappointing showing at Final Round in Riga this past summer. Meanwhile Yvonne Turner has also been turning the dial up for Nadezhda and she will be pulling the strings for Hungary. 

Where are you?

In recent times, Spain and France have dominated the quest to land the coveted FIBA Women's EuroBasket title, with the former winning it in 2013, 2017 and 2019 and France making every Final since 2013. But don't expect to see them in these Qualifiers, since they are co-hosts in 2021 and qualify automatically. Not that they will be completely inactive during this next week or so, since they will be playing each other, which will be interesting in itself.

The social media standouts

If you're wondering who the social media stars of this window are likely to be, then you could check in with Isil Alben of Turkey. The Galatasaray guard has 217,000 followers on Twitter and 200,000 on Instagram. Two other players who have got hugely popular social media game are Cecilia Zanadalsini of Italy, while Maria Vadeeva of Russia is seeing her channels growing rapidly – helped by her improvement in English after her WNBA time at the Los Angeles Sparks. Finally, don't forget to follow the official tournament channels @EuroBasketWomen on Twitter and Instagram and also use #EuroBasketWomen.

'Hej' to Denmark!

That's right, it's a big hello to Denmark, since they are the only one of the 33 participating teams who didn't play in the previous Qualifiers. However, while a step up, they should still be respected, since they won the FIBA Women's European Championship for Small Countries last year.

The young guns ready to fire

There will be an opportunity for some of the rising stars of the European game to make an impression and leading that list is 13-year-old Lithuanian sensation Juste Jocyte. While she is not expected to feature against Turkey, will she get to make her senior competitive debut against Albania, having also reportedly signed for Tony Parker to play at the Lyon Asvel Academy? Elsewhere, will Billie Massey make a splash for the Belgian Cats? She was in the All-Star Five at the FIBA U19 Women's Basketball World Cup earlier this summer and then the teenager has also smashed it in EuroCup Women with Hema Basket SKW, taking a weekly EuroCup Women honor recently. Or, what about Finland's dunking youth star, Awak Kuier? 

Never mind qualification, just give us a W!

During their previous Qualification campaigns, Albania, Bulgaria, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, North Macedonia and Switzerland were a combined 0-30. So, just getting a victory on the board will be the first mission and mean so much.

Focus and don't mention February

For Serbia, Great Britain, Belgium and Sweden, this is all about focus. They will naturally be excited that their respective Tokyo 2020 dreams are alive, but they can't look past this window - even if they can't wait for the FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournaments that will take place in February. 

A sole All-Star Five survivor

From the All-Star Five at Final Round earlier this summer, only Temi Fagbenle of Great Britain will be playing in these Qualifiers. The 2019 MVP Astou Ndour and her Spanish teammate Marta Xargay, plus Sandrine Gruda of France all represent co-hosts who qualify automatically, while Sonja Petrovic of Serbia is currently sidelined with an injury.

Big breakthrough or big stumble?

Who do you think will make a move in this first window? Volume 1 of Power Rankings are out and based on who we think has the best chance of progressing before the first ball has even been bounced. There are some surprises like Turkey not being in our Top 14 and perhaps Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and Lithuania as a trio of surprise entrants. Then again, the Power Rankings might change hugely once these first tow games are completed!

The Cats boast two WNBA champions

Belgium will welcome back their super duo Kim Mestdagh and Emma Meesseman who were crowned WNBA champions last month with the Washington Mystics. The latter has also caught added attention of late through her Players' Voice feature when she talks about that title success and speaks about now turning her attention back to the Belgian Cats.

Stats life

What kind of highs can we look for in these Qualifiers? Well, if we look at the previous ones for the FIBA Women's EuroBasket 2019, there were some incredible individual performances, with Marica Gajic grabbing 27 rebounds in a game for Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is difficult to imagine anyone topping that effort! Alina Iagupova posted a score of 41 in one outing for Ukraine, while one of the more unusual outcomes was a forward in Anastasiya Verameyenka of Belarus topping the game-high assists table with 11 against Estonia. One interesting target for the players to aspire to this time around, is that nobody blocked more than 5 shots in any of the previous Qualifiers.

The standout games... on paper

If you want some of the biggest and best games to sketch down on your watch-list, then our top five of this window would be:  Serbia v Turkey, Belgium v Ukraine, Italy v Czech Republic, Turkey v Lithuania, Great Britain v Belarus and finally, Hungary v Slovakia.

FIBA