William Jones Cup Explained

R. William Jones Cup
Last Season:	2024 William Jones Cup
Sport:	Basketball
Inaugural:	1977
Teams:	M: 9 W: 6
Champion:	M: Strong Group Athletics (1st title, 7th title for country) W: Japan Universiade (1st title, 5th for country)
Most Champs:	M: (16 titles) W: (12 titles)
Website:	William Jones Cup
Related Comps:	FIBA Stanković Continental Champions' Cup

The R. William Jones Cup, also known as the Jones Cup, is an international basketball tournament organized by the Chinese Taipei Basketball Association (CTBA) held annually since 1977 in Taiwan.

It was named in honor of basketball promoter Renato William Jones, who was one of the founders of the International Basketball Federation (FIBA). Like the Olympics and the FIBA Basketball World Cup, it has both men's and women's versions. Despite lacking the prestige of the Olympic tournament and the FIBA World Championship, it is a tournament that draws global interest. Like the FIBA Stanovic Continental Champions Cup, the Renato Williams Jones Cup serves as a preparation for major tournaments, such as the Olympic Basketball Tournament, the FIBA World Cup, and the continental tournaments. Also, the Renato Williams Jones Cup serves and promotes basketball in the world. The men's version is currently being dominated by American teams since the tournament's inaugural staging while the women's version is being jointly dominated by South Korean, American and Taiwanese teams. It also invites professional club, collegiate and national teams from around the world, although the participants are mainly from the Asian, European, Egyptian and North American regions.

In both tournaments, each country can only be represented by one team, which could be its national team, youth team, club team, or an all-star selection, except for the hosts Taiwan, which could opt to have two teams.

Since the tournament is not sanctioned by FIBA, the Taiwanese national team which usually competes as "Chinese Taipei" is referred to as "Republic of China" by the organizers.

The tournament has not been held from 2020 to 2022 due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Taiwan.

History

The tournament was conceived in 1977 as a tribute to Englishman Renato William Jones, who was FIBA secretary-general for 44 years and was instrumental in the granting of zone commission status for Asia at the 1964 FIBA World Congress in Tokyo. Jones also attended the Asian Basketball Championships in 1963, which was held in Taipei.^[1]

The invitational tournament organized by the Chinese Taipei Basketball Association was made following the admission of the People's Republic of China as a regular member of the ABC in 1975.^[1]

The William Jones Cup has been cancelled in three separate occasions; in 1989 when the main venue was affected by fire, in 2003 due to the SARS outbreak, and in 2020 to 2022 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.^[2]

Champions

Men's tournament

Summaries

Edition	Year	Champions	Runners-up	Third place
1st	1977	Athletes in Action - Eastern Unit	Eastern Washington Eagles	Flying Camel
2nd	1978	American Buluside		American College
3rd	1979	Not held
4th	1980
5th	1981	Northern Cement
6th	1982
7th	1983	Vanderbilt Commodores^[3]	Murray International Metals^[4]
8th	1984
9th	1985	San Miguel
10th	1986
11th	1987
12th	1988
	1989	Cancelled due to fire which affected the main venue
13th	1990			A-10 All-Stars^[5]
14th	1991
15th	1992	Marathon Oil	USK Praha
16th	1993	University of Hawaii	Hung Kuo	Spartak
17th	1994		Yulong
18th	1995			Hung Kuo
19th	1996
20th	1997	Kangoo Jumps	BC Lietuvos Rytas
21st	1998	Philippine Centennial Team
22nd	1999
23rd	2000
24th	2001
25th	2002	Great Mates	University of Alberta
	2003	Cancelled due to SARS outbreak
26th	2004			Perth Wildcats
27th	2005	Passing Lane
28th	2006	Athletes in Action
29th	2007
30th	2008		Athletes in Action
31st	2009
32nd	2010
33rd	2011
34th	2012		Mahram Tehran	UPG
35th	2013
36th	2014	Ulsan Mobis Phoebus
37th	2015
38th	2016	Mighty Sports
39th	2017	Team Canada 150	Atletas All-Star Lithuania
40th	2018	3D Global Sports
41st	2019	Mighty Sports
	2020	Cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic
	2021
	2022
42nd	2023	UC Irvine Anteaters		Anyang KGC
43rd	2024

Medal table

width=140px	Country !	width=70px	!	width=70px	!	width=70px	!	width=70px	Total
	16	5	6	27
	7	1	3	11
	5	2	0	7
	3	4	0	7
	2	10	5	17
	2	7	7	16
	2	1	0	3
	1	1	2	4
	1	1	1	3
	1	0	1	2
	1	0	0	1
	1	0	0	1
	0	2	1	3
	0	2	0	2
	0	1	1	2
	0	1	0	1
	0	1	0	1
	0	1	0	1
	0	1	0	1
	0	1	0	1
	0	0	4	4
	0	0	2	2
	0	0	2	2
	0	0	1	1
	0	0	1	1
	0	0	1	1
	0	0	1	1
	0	0	1	1
	0	0	1	1

Women's tournament

Summaries

width=10%	Year !	width=30%	Champions !	width=30%	Runners-up !	width=30%	Third place
1977	Korean All-Stars	Cathay Life	Christa Dream
1978	Not held
1979		Korean All-Stars	China Airlines
1980
1981
1982
1983
1984
1985
1986	Not held
1987
1988
1989	Cancelled due to fire which affected the main venue
1990
1991
1992	American All-Stars
1993	Cathay Life
1994			Al Hasa
1995	Cathay Life
1996
1997			Cathay Life
1998
1999
2000
2001	Not held
2002
2003	Cancelled due to SARS outbreak
2004
2005			Zhejiang Huadong
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010			University All-Stars
2011
2012	Cathay Life	Chunghwa Telecom
2013
2014		Denso Iris
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019	Mitsubishi Electric Koalas
2020	Cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic
2021
2022
2023	Chanson V-Magic	Busan BNK Sum
2024	Japan Universiade

Medal table

width=140px	Country !	width=70px	!	width=70px	!	width=70px	!	Total
	12	6	3	21
	9	4	5	18
	8	12	15	35
	5	9	5	19
	2	1	0	3
	1	3	1	5
	1	2	3	6
	1	0	0	1
	1	0	0	1
	0	1	2	3
	0	1	1	2
	0	0	1	1
	0	0	1	1
	0	0	1	1
	0	0	1	1
	0	1	0	1
	0	0	1	1

See also

• List of sporting events in Taiwan

Notes and References

1. News: Henson. Joaquin. All about the Jones Cup. 9 March 2016. Sporting Chance. The Philippine Star. 29 August 2012.
2. News: Huang . Chiao-wen . Yeh . Joseph . Taiwan cancels this year's William Jones Cup due to COVID-19 . 3 July 2020 . 2 July 2020.
3. News: U.S. clips New Zealand in Jones Cup basketball. 29 December 2015. Associated Press. Lawrence Journal-World. 2 July 1983. Taipei.
4. News: Sport in Brief - Basketball. 29 December 2015. The Glasgow Herald. 6 July 1983.
5. News: Rutger's player stars in victory. 29 December 2015. Gadsden Times. 24 July 1990. Taipei.