The second edition of the event is scheduled to take place from September 9 to 11, when 11 men’s and 11 women’s teams will compete for honours.

A total of 49 teams from 28 different countries will battle for places at the Championships with qualification events due to be hosted by Latvia’s capital Riga and Szolnok in Hungary on July 16 and 17.

The teams have been divided based on the FIBA 3x3 Federation Ranking, which is the main criteria used to identify the teams qualified to the national-team based 3x3 official competitions.

Romania’s men and Spain’s women are considered the teams to beat at the qualifier in Riga, while The Netherlands’ men and Hungary’s women carry the mantle in Szolnok.

As they feature fewer teams, Riga’s men's qualifier and Szolnok’s women’s qualifier will only offer places for five teams.

Six teams from the other two qualifiers will earn a ticket to Debrecen, where 22 teams will look to follow in the footsteps of Turkey's men and Hungary's women, the winners of the inaugural FIBA Under-18 3x3 European Championships held last year in Belarus' capital Minsk. 

Debrecen also played host to the 2015 FIBA Under-18 3x3 World Championships and has committed to staging the annual European Championships until 2018.

Ahead of this year’s European Championships, the second largest city in Hungary will organise a one-week-long festival dedicated to 3x3 basketball on Kossuth Square in front of the iconic Reformed Great Church.

This will include a leg of the 2016 FIBA 3x3 World Tour on September 7 and 8.

Riga will be hosting a FIBA 3x3 European Championships qualifier - either under-18 or senior - for a third time, while Szolnok will be staging a FIBA 3x3 official competition for the first time.

FIBA's media and marketing director Frank Leenders told insidethegames at last month's SPORTELAsia that the governing body's expectations over the inclusion of 3x3 basketball on the Tokyo 2020 sports programme are "very high". 

As it is a new discipline rather than a new sport, the process for 3x3's Tokyo 2020 inclusion has not yet begun.

There is a growing lobby of support, however, from within the basketball community and the International Olympic Committee.

The final decision is likely to be discussed following this year's Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.