Luka Doncic has well and truly established himself as one of the best players in the world. Just five seasons into his NBA career, his last four have seen him average at least 27 points and at least eight rebounds and assists, and last year those numbers were up to 32.4/8.6/8.0. He would be by far the best player on just about any team in the world, and that is absolutely set to be the case as he leads Team Slovenia at the upcoming FIBA World Cup. Doncic's performance will be a significant determining factor in just how far this team can go, and with that in mind, here are three bold predictions for Luka Doncic at the 2023 FIBA World Cup.

3. Luka Doncic to lead all players in field goal attempts

Doncic is, by his nature, a ball-dominant player, and he would take a lot of shots regardless of which team he was playing on – and fair enough, too, given he goes at close to 50% from the field in the NBA. Playing for Team Slovenia, expect the percentage of his team's shots that he takes to be even greater than what it is for the Mavs. A good indicator of how often he will shoot comes from the 2022 EuroBasket tournament, in which Slovenia finished sixth. Doncic was unsurprisingly a dominant force in that tournament, and he led it in total shots per game with 18.7 – just above Bulgaria's Aleksander Vezenkov at 18.6, and more than tournament points leaders Giannis Antetokounmpo and Lauri Markkanen, who took 17.7 and 17.1 per game respectively. Expect similar numbers at this event, with Doncic taking close to 20 shots per game for Slovenia.

2. Luka Doncic to average 27/7/7

This might not sound like the boldest of claims given that he's averaged these numbers in each of his last four NBA seasons, but bear in mind that he loses 17% of game time at the FIBA World Cup, in which quarters last just 10 minutes. With 12 minute quarters, this stat line equates to closer to 32.5/8.5/8.5 – some pretty absurd numbers. But Doncic is more than capable of achieving it, and as mentioned above he'll have the ball in his hands plenty. At the aforementioned EuroBasket, Doncic averaged 26.0 points, 7.7 rebounds and 6.6 assists per game. With another year of professional basketball experience under his belt and on a team in which he'll be so far and away the best player it's not even funny, he can up those numbers even further at the 2023 FIBA World Cup.

1. Luka Doncic to lead Team Slovenia to the FIBA World Cup quarterfinals

For Slovenia to do any damage at the 2023 FIBA World Cup, Doncic will need to play damn well, and he probably will. With him at the helm, they should be confident in their ability to finish on top of Group F, which they share with Cape Verde, Georgia and Venezuela. Venezuela is the only of those ranked inside the top 30, but though they are a developing young team they have struggled substantially in some of their warm-up games, most notably when they scored 11 combined points in the second and third quarter against the Boomers. If they do go through that stage undefeated, they'll head to the Second Round and likely play Germany and Australia. They just need to finish in the top two of that Second Round group to advance to the quarterfinals, and given that results from the First Round carry over to the second and Slovenia should be 3-0 to start, they can make their way to the quarterfinals. They will have a little more difficulty thereafter against some quality opposition, but with Luka Doncic leading the way they can make the final eight after having not qualified for the previous FIBA World Cup.