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At World Cup, Rudy Fernandez aims for the unprecedented

At World Cup, Rudy Fernandez aims for the unprecedented

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24 August 20233 Mins read

Javier Gancedo

Rudy Fernandez lifts the 2019 FIBA World Cup trophy with his Spain teammates in the background.

Spain heads into the 2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup as the defending champion with a chance to become the fourth team to win back-to-back titles after Brazil (1959, 1963), Yugoslavia (1970, 1974, 1978; 1998, 2002) and the United States (2010, 2014). If Spain captures another gold medal, Real Madrid's swingman Rudy Fernandez would become the first player in basketball history to win the World Cup three times.

Just 18 players have won the competition twice, and the list includes basketball greats such as Sergei Belov, Kresimir Cosic, Vlade Divac, Dejan Bodiroga, Stephen Curry, Derrick Rose and Marc Gasol, the latter of whom won it alongside Fernandez in 2006 and 2019.

Fernandez doesn't need a third World Cup title to cement his legendary list of honors, but a third such medal would put him in a league of his own.

A chance to make more history

Fernandez is already in some rare company. He's among just three players - with Belov and Bodiroga - who have won multiple EuroBasket, EuroLeague and World Cup titles. Rudy lifted EuroLeague trophies with Real in 2015, 2018 and 2023 and earned EuroBasket gold medals in 2009, 2011, 2015 and 2022. If Rudy wins another World Cup, he would have reached glory in all three competitions on at least three occasions.

The World Cup gives Fernandez another opportunity to make history at the Olympics, too, as the 2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup will produce seven directly qualified national teams for the 2024 Summer Games in Paris, France. Two teams will be European, and France is already qualified as the host squad.

If Spain makes it to the 2024 Olympics and Fernandez is among the players called up, he would be the first player to compete in the men's basketball tournament six times. Only seven basketball players have been to the Olympics five times, three of whom are Spanish: Fernandez, Juan Carlos Navarro and Pau Gasol. The other four players are: Teo Cruz of Puerto Rico, Oscar Schmidt of Brazil, Andrew Gaze of Australia and Luis Scola of Argentina. That would give Rudy a chance to win a fourth Olympic medal, joining Belov, Carmelo Anthony and Gennadi Volnov on that short list.

Success is never far away from Rudy

At age 38, Fernandez is one of the most successful players in basketball history. His personal roll of honors includes six Spanish League trophies, six Spanish Cups and eight Spanish Super Cup titles, as well as the EuroCup crown with Joventut Badalona in 2008, the Intercontinental Cup with Real in 2015 (in his only appearance in that tournament) and the FIBA EuroChallenge trophy in 2006 with Joventut. A two-time All-EuroLeague First Team selection, Fernandez was also chosen as the 2006-07 EuroLeague Rising Star.

And now, Fernandez going for an unprecedented accomplishment, something that no one else has come close to since the game of basketball was invented in 1891.