On Saturday, Sweden – believe it or not – will play in the round of 16 in the European Championship in basketball against either Serbia or Turkey in Riga.
The UK defeated, highly sensationally, Montenegro with 89–83 in Wednesday's early match when group B was to be concluded in Tampere.
The UK, Montenegro, and Sweden thus ended up with one win each – and the Swedes highest in the table of the three teams thanks to the best result in mutual matches.
After Sweden's narrow loss to Montenegro on Monday, the only hope was that group last UK would finish the group stage by taking their first and only win.
"Fantastically happy"
So it was, and the Swedish Basketball Federation can send a bouquet of flowers each to Myles Hesson and Akwasi Yeboah, the Brits who scored 25 and 23 points respectively when they got Montenegro to fall.
The national team's sports manager Lasse Johansson to SVT about what he felt after the bang:
Fantastically happy I must say. I'm glad for the sake of this group, because it's incredibly well-deserved.
I can be completely honest and say that if I had played on the match, I would have put all my money on Montenegro. I hadn't counted on this.
"Celebrated in there"
After a strong start by Montenegro, the Brits came back and they had control for much of the match. Montenegro was in the lead 81–80 with less than two minutes left, but then the UK responded with a strong finish that arranged a small blue and yellow basketball miracle.
Sweden was already in the arena to prepare for their meeting with Lithuania – and the association has in social media published a video from the locker room where the national team celebrates wildly after the British triumph.
We all celebrated in there, before the match. After that, I thought that we still have to play well in this match (against Lithuania), because it's like a warm-up before we move on, says Denzel Andersson to SVT.
Then Sweden went out pressed and Lithuania – ranked tenth in the world – in the fifth and final group stage match. But in the end, Lithuania won with 74–71 – and Sweden has in three of their four European Championship losses lost narrowly.
Late on Wednesday evening, Serbia and Turkey, both undefeated, meet in a meeting for first place in group A. The winner there will face Sweden on Saturday.
After the UK's victory over Montenegro, three teams ended up with the same points in the battle for fourth place. Then the results in the trio's mutual matches decide:
Sweden-UK 78–59, Sweden-Montenegro 81–87, UK-Montenegro 89–83.
In the mutual table, Sweden has the best point difference (+13), ahead of Montenegro (0) and the UK (–13).
