Canada’s dream of Olympics berth still alive

SHANGHAI, China — Barring an unforeseen surprise from FIBA, it appears Team Canada’s dream of a berth in the Olympics remains alive.

By no means will achieving that be easy, but following a 2-3 finish to their FIBA World Cup play here, a berth in next summer’s Last Chance Qualifier appears a lock.

“It looks to us that our goal of working to get to the Olympics is still very much there,” Canada Basketball general manager Rowan Barrett said following an 82-76 loss to Germany to put a tail on Canada’s FIBA experience.

The two wins are the most Canada has had in this tournament in a quarter of a century but there remains the feeling that it could have been so much more. Just a little more buy-in from some of the NBA talent with Canadian passports that opted out of the tournament for injury, scheduling or contract reasons could have made for a different result.

Same for just a little more consistency from the gritty group that did answer the call for the country.

“We had moments in this tournament where we played really well, and we had some times where we didn’t, and that was a microcosm of our situation this tournament,” Canadian veteran Melvin Ejim said. “Would’ve liked to have played better those first two games (losses to Australia and Lithuania), and shot it as well as we did in the game against Jordan (a FIBA record 24 three-point makes), but doesn’t always work like that. But I thought we came out, we played hard, and we tried to give ourselves a chance.”

Kyle Wiltjer, who turned heads throughout this tournament with his shooting, had a tough start to Monday’s finale against Germany but caught fire late to finish with 18 points in the loss.

He saw his team, blessed with just two NBA players, make steps throughout.