Neemias Queta in the 15 pre-selected for Eurobasket2025

Center Neemias Queta, a player for the Boston Celtics of the North American Basketball League (NBA), is among the 15 pre-selected players from Portugal for the final phase of the 2025 European Championship, in a list that will still be reduced to 12.

The Boston Celtics player, who did not participate in the qualifying phase due to commitments with the Celtics, is one of the new additions to the squad for the last two qualifying games, in February, along with Nuno Sá (Galomar).

On the other hand, young winger André Cruz, a Sporting player, who will miss the final phase of Eurobasket2025 due to injury, is not part of the call-up announced by coach Mário Gomes today.

Of the list of 26 pre-selection players announced on May 15, the departure of winger/center Rúben Prey, a 20-year-old player and 2.08 meters tall who plays for St. John's University in the United States, is also noteworthy.

The other players excluded were the basemen Carlos Cardoso (Oliveirense), Gustavo Teixeira (Ovarense), José Barbosa (Benfica), Miguel Correia (Galitos do Barreiro), Pedro Bastos (Vitória de Guimarães) and Sérgio Silva (Sporting), the wingers Diogo Araújo (Oliveirense), João Grosso (Winterthur) and Rodrigo Soeiro (Ovarense) and the center Sasa Borovnjak (Antibes).

The 15 players now chosen will meet on July 22nd, in Coimbra, and will play the first three preparation games in Spain, with the main team of the neighboring country, on August 5th, and Spain 'B', on the 7th, at the Malaga International Tournament, and Argentina, on the 10th, in Madrid.

Afterwards, the Portuguese team returns home for the Braga International Tournament, facing Iceland on August 15th and Sweden the following day.

At Eurobasket2025, the 'quinas' team will face Serbia, with Nikola Jokic, co-host Latvia, with Kristaps Porzingis, the Czech Republic, Turkey and Estonia in Group A, in Riga, and will make its debut on August 27, against the Czechs.

Then, Mário Gomes' team will face the Serbs (29 August), the Turks (30 August), the Latvians (1 September) and the Estonians (3 September).

To qualify for the round of 16, which will take place in Riga, like the entire knockout phase, Portugal will have to finish in one of the top four places.

The Portuguese team has participated in the final phase three times, having been 15th out of 18 teams in 1951 in France, an edition in which they played by invitation, ninth out of 16 in 2007 in Spain, and 21st out of 24, with a total of five defeats, in 2011 in Lithuania.

Portugal qualified for Eurobasket2025 by winning Group F of the second pre-qualifying round, ahead of Bulgaria, Romania and Cyprus, and finishing third in Group A of the qualifying phase, behind Israel and Slovenia and ahead of Ukraine.

The final phase of the 2025 European Championship, which will be the 42nd edition of the event, will take place in Latvia, Cyprus, Finland and Poland, between 27 August and 14 September.

List of 15 pre-summoned players:

– Bases: Anthony da Silva (Évreux Basket, France), Diogo Brito (Ourense, Spain), Diogo Gameiro (Benfica), Diogo Ventura (Sporting), Francisco Amarante (Oviedo, Spain) and Rafael Lisboa (Ourense, Spain).

– Wingers: Nuno Sá (Galomar), Travante Williams (Oradea, Rom) and Vladyslav Voytso (Cantabria, Esp).

– Centers: Cândido Sá (CB Cáceres, Spain), Daniel Relvão (Benfica), Gonçalo Delgado (FC Porto), Miguel Queiroz (FC Porto), Neemias Queta (Boston Celtics, USA) and Ricardo Monteiro (Vitória de Guimarães).