2012 FIBA Europe
U18 European Championship
8 teams for 1 title
8 teams for 5 places

After a week of pressure at the FIBA Europe U18 European Championship for Women Division A in Bucharest, all the players have a day off before the final climb towards the summit begins.

The qualifying round has come to an end with Croatia, France, Italy, Netherlands, Russia, Serbia, Spain and Turkey qualifying for the quarter-final matches.

This year the quarter-final match-ups have double importance because the winners will book their tickets for the 2013 edition of the U19 World Championship.

While the semi-finalists will continue their battle to become the European Champions, the four losers will play off for the fifth spot for the U19 FIBA World Championship for Women.

Russia grabbed the last quarter-final place from Group E by defeating Sweden (70-65) in their last group game which also happened to be a "an elimination game".

A three-ball by Olga Novikova from Russia with 30 seconds to play turned out to be the knock-out blow for Sweden.

Sweden led at the break (37-32) but had problems in containing Alexandra Marchenkova, who scored 18 points and Albina Razheva who contributed 17 points and 12 rebounds.

For Sweden Paulina Hersler picked a double double of 20 points and 12 rebounds. She also had 3 blocks.

In the rest of Group E action Spain had no problems in beating already eliminated Greece (76-36) with a balanced scoring attack, with only Irene Gari finishing in double digits with 14 points.

France crushed the boards hard with 52 rebounds against Turkey. But they had to wait until the final quarter to tame Turkey and win the match (63-54).

Valeriane Ayayi and Aby Gaye with 14 and 13 points respectively and 10 rebounds each were the leading offensive players for France. Olivia Epoupa added 6 more assists to her account which keeps her in first place in the assists statistic.

You may watch the FIBA Europe highlights for France in action:

In Group F the Slovak Republic and Slovenia were the two teams to lose out on the final day of the qualifying round.

Croatia ended the dreams of the Slovenians in this competition with a big win (77-40) while Serbia shut out the Slovak Republic (71-56).

Italy also saved themselves from a possible elimination by beating the Netherlands (64-56).

The quarter-final pairings are follows:

1. France vs. Croatia
2. Italy vs. Russia
3. Spain vs. Serbia
4. Netherlands vs. Turkey

In the relegation group the Czech Republic finished the first phase with an important victory against Belgium (64-62) to go top of the group with three wins from three games.

Poland beat Romania (82-62) in the other game. Romania's adventure in Division A at U18 level is slowly coming to an end. A defeat in their next game or a victory for the Czech Republic will seal their relegation.