RELEASED: Wednesday, May 23, 2007

UW-Stout's Andrist to Coach Qatar National Team

Menomonie, Wis.--University of Wisconsin-Stout men's basketball coach Eddie Andrist could be living out the Olympic dream.

Andrist spent his spring break selecting the 16-member men's national basketball team for the tiny Arabian peninsula country of Qatar. This will be Andrist's second foray into international basketball with Qatar. Andrist coached the Qatar Under-20 national team to the Asian Youth Championships in 2000.

Andrist, along with former Blue Devil assistant coach Eric Gardow, will return to Qatar in May to begin training, a training program that will take the team to the countries of Slovenia, Egypt, back to Qatar, Taiwan, and China before traveling to Japan for the Asian Games and the Olympic qualifier in late July.

"Asian basketball talent and focus is at an all time high and to win on this big of stage will be extremely difficult," Andrist said. "There will be no margin for error so the health and fitness of our team will be critical. The team will have to learn my system quickly in order to have a chance."

If the Qatar team wins the Asian Games - China, with NBA superstar Yao Ming leading the way, is the favorite - they would qualify to compete in the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, China, with Andrist as the head coach, living out an Olympic dream.

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