Nikola Jokic is looking to match Marc Gasol’s feat when he suits up for Serbia in the FIBA Basketball World Cup set from 25 August to 10 September.
The 28-year-old Jokic is looking to become only the second player to win the National Basketball Association and World Cup titles in the same year.
Jokic pocketed the Larry O’Brien trophy after leading the Denver Nuggets to a masterful 4-1 series victory over the Miami Heat in the recent NBA Finals.
He averaged 30.2 points, 14 rebounds and 7.2 assists per game in the Finals to emerge as Most Valuable Player.
On the same note, he is also looking to win the James Naismith trophy for Serbia. The Serbians won the World Cup crown in 1998 in Greece and 2002 in the United States.
Gasol is the only player to win the NBA and World Cup crowns when he played a pivotal role in the Toronto Raptors’ championship run in 2019, the same year when China ruled the prestigious 32-nation tourney in China.
But matching Gasol’s feat will not be easy.
Serbia, which finished fifth in the previous edition of the World Cup, is bunched with South Sudan, China and Puerto Rico in Group B of the preliminaries.
South Sudan has a handful of players over 6-foot-8 playing in the NBA G-League, Australia, and New Zealand so it is expected to defend Jokic by committee.
Nuni Omot, South Sudan’s leading scorer in the African Qualifiers, will have to make him work on defense as well to expend some of his stamina.
China also has a lot of bigs but it might be up to 2016 NBA Draftees Zhou Qi and Wang Zhelin to face Jokic.
Puerto Rico might pose the biggest challenge for Serbia in the initial group stage as it can put 6-foot-10 youngster George Conditt or the veteran Ismael Romero on Jokic.
With Italy poised to top Group A, which also has the Dominican Republic, the Philippines, and Angola, an early matchup between two powerhouse teams will be a hot ticket in Group I action.
The last time these two teams clashed was in the 2022 Eurobasket Round of 16 with tenth-ranked Italy scoring a minor upset of sixth-ranked Serbia.
In that game, Jokic dropped 32 points and 14 rebounds in their 86-94 loss. It could be up to the likes of veterans Nicolo Melli, Achille Polonara, and Luigi Datome to battle Jokic, but the Azzurri may also get help from 2022 NBA Draft top pick Paolo Banchero.
Jokic could also be matched up against fellow NBA players Karl Anthony-Towns of the Dominican Republic or Bruno Fernandez of Angola in the second phase or face off against Japeth Aguilar and June Mar Fajardo of the Philippines as he did in 2019.
