The draw for the 2014 FIBA Basketball World Cup took place on 3 February 2014 at 19:00 CET at the Palau de la Música Catalana, Barcelona.[1] The draw ceremony determined the groups in which the 32 participating teams would begin the final tournament. Teams were divided into six pots of four teams, with each team being selected from each pot to assigned groups.
The three best-qualified teams as per the latest FIBA World Rankings at the time were placed in Pot 1. The 20 other teams were placed in Pots 2 to 6, also according to ranking, geographical principles, and sporting criteria. The draw sequence began with Pot 1 and ended with Pot 6, and a competition number was drawn for each team, which determined its position in the group and the order of games in each group, such as "A1" to "A6", for Group A teams.[2]
Former Spanish national team member Juan Antonio San Epifanio, Croatia's Dino Rađa, José Ortiz of Puerto Rico and Angolan Jean-Jacques Conceição assisted in the draw.[3]
Teams were seeded using the latest FIBA World Rankings and geographical principles at the time of the draw, with some pots containing teams from the same continent. The highest-ranked team not to qualify for the World Cup was sixth-ranked Russia.
| Pot 1 | Pot 2 | Pot 3 | Pot 4 | Pot 5 | Pot 6 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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The four groups were formed randomly, selecting one team from each of the six pots. There were no restrictions in drawing teams from pots except for the following:[4]
After each team was drawn, FIBA assigned a host city to each group, except for final phase host cities Madrid and Barcelona.
