Just one week before the FIBA 3×3 World Cup takes place in the Philippines (June 8-12), a total of 22 World Cup players have competed in the Ulaanbaatar 3×3 Challenger. The event was held in the Mongolian capital on 2-3 June.

Traditionally players would have two main goals when entering a Challenger: the 20,000 USD in prize money and the two tickets to the World Tour (in this case, the Kuala Lumpur Masters). However in Ulaanbaatar, some of the biggest 3×3 stars also had the opportunity of making last minute adjustments to their technique before heading into the 3×3 World Cup, where they will be representing their country.

Behind Novi Sad (Serbia), Piran (Slovenia), Moskva (Russian Federation), a mixture of Gdansk Energa 3×3 and Kolobrzeg (Poland), Ulaanbaatar (Mongolia) and Saskatoon (Canada), it’s basically the Serbian, Slovenian, Russian, Polish, Mongolian and Canadian national teams which tested themselves in Mongolia in the weekend. Three top ten and four more top 23 teams in the world competed in Ulaanbaatar. Mongolian Khovd, who reached the Wuxi Challenger semi-finals, and the recent finalists of the Sydney Challenger challenged in Pool A.

Four teams have already stamped their ticket to the Kuala Lumpur Masters, which will be staged on October 13-14: Zemun (Serbia) and Kranj (Slovenia) – based on ranking, Princeton (USA) and Liman (Serbia).