Joakim Noah:
Basketball might be bigger in Lithuania than even back in America.
Passion for the sport seen in every sector of society

By Christopher Johnson - Special to The Washington Times

KAUNAS, Lithuania — While American basketball addicts are growing anxious over the NBA lockout, fans in that other hotbed of basketball —Lithuania — are in hoop heaven as they host some of the best players and action in the world at Eurobasket 2011.

Joakim Noah, the French center who led the Chicago Bulls deep into the playoffs last season, calls EuroBasket “an NBA playoff environment. It’s very similar in terms of energy.”

That’s not only because of NBA Finals MVPs Dirk Nowitzki and Tony Parker playing for Germany and France. 

Noah, a dual citizen of France and the U.S. who was born in New York City, said that basketball might be bigger in Lithuania than even back in America.

“Lithuania’s population is probably smaller than the state of Indiana, but you see the love and passion they have for the game here,” he said after France beat Greece on Thursday to advance to the semifinals. “Even the girl on the cover of the Lithuanian Playboy magazine has a basketball in her hand.”

Many American fans have never heard of EuroBasket. But an increasing number of U.S.-based players and basketball officials, who are watching the games on ESPN3.com, are realizing that some of the most dramatic and hard-fought action is happening across the Atlantic.

Read ‘The Washington Post’ article at
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/sep/18/hoops-hysteria-grips-lithuania/