FIBA World Championship

The FIBA World Championship is an international basketball competition contested by the men's national basketball teams of FIBA. The competition is currently held on a four-year cycle which has been the case since the first edition in 1950.

History
The first international basketball competition was held in South America in 1930 and with Europe holding their first tournament in 1935 and the success of the two Olympic basketball tournaments it was decided that a World Cup edition would be agreed with Argentina being the host nation as they were the only country willing to take this massive risk. The first tournament would see a ten team tournament with the top three of the previous Olympics, the two best teams from South America, Europe and Asia. But with Asian teams not being entered, other teams were required to fill the entry list of ten teams. Argentina would take out the very first title after doing a five from five matches in the final round which did include a win over the United States to record the first championship.

The second edition of the tournament was held in Brazil with the United States taking out their first of many titles in the World Championship after they went unbeaten to take home the title with all of the wins being above 20 points. The Philippines and Fossoa created history by being the first countries from Asia to compete in the World Championship and for the Philippines, they became the first country from outside of the Americas to get a medal when they finished third in the final round. The following edition was originally going to be held in the Philippines but after the president of the nation wasn't giving visas to the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia. This meant that the tournament was stripped and moved back to Brazil for the following edition.