And the joy of winning a Challenger on a weekend like this is just as great as the joy of winning a Masters:
Last weekend three tournaments were played: in Athens (Greece), Hanchuan (China), and Darkhan (Mongolia). We found some results, games and players pretty… entertaining. But for you some of them may come to you also as a surprise.
Athens Challenger
Young Lithuanians from VDU University in Vilnius, playing under the name Akademija VDU, they played extremely well and went all the way from qualifying draw to semifinals. They surprised Toulouse with tough defense and killer finish, and later on won against shorthanded, but still mighty Miami:
Remember these names, we can see them soon in Masters on national teams tournament:
Paulis Velutis (22 years old, 193 cm) - 7 points per game, 40% from outside
Arturas Vilutis (20 years old, 204 cm) - 9/10 from inside, 0 turnovers
Rokas Maciulis (26 years old, 194 cm) - 8/10 from inside
Arunas Rimkus (22 years old, 194 cm) - 10 assists
Surprise? Not really. Basketball is a religion in Lithuania, they probably can create 20 rosters like this… and we won’t be surprised if they do, as 3x3 is now treated very seriously in this country.
Hanchuan
If you are surprise that team from Switzerland - Lausanne - has won it all, we are here to remind you, that this team (to be precise like a Swiss, 3/4 of the team) finished World Cup 2025 with silver medal, beaten by Spaniards in the final game. The quarter-final revenge win against Valencia for sure tasted good!
They had to beat Skyliners twice to win the tournament, and the second win, in the final game, was even better than the first one:
So, definitely not a surprise, especially taking into consideration other teams playing in China this weekend.
By the way, this photo makes us think that Thomas and Natan Jurkovitz were not the only brothers playing in the final game:
Darkhan
Roko Spaseski Baburek (24 years old, 201 cm) from Cibona (4th place) can play streetball…
…which is not a big surprise, as we are tracking him for some time.
But we just discovered his previous sport career chapter. That’s why he can jump so high on the court, he used to be a professional high jumper:
And that’s a real surprise, at least for us! In the opposite to Liman taking the first place.
Did you notice anything interesting, non-obvious or simply funny during this weekend?
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