However, in recent years the national team has struggled to maintain consistency to reach major international tournaments.

Three years after achieving success at the continental level, the Netherlands qualified to the World Cup for the first time in 1986.

The national team ultimately did not make it out of the group stage though, finishing the tournament with an (2–3) record to place 14th overall.

Home games were usually played at the Topsportcentrum in Almere and usually had little to no media attention or fan support in the Netherlands.

The team eventually shocked the world, by beating heavy favorite Montenegro to get the second place in their group.

In contrast to the summer of 2014, big name players from foreign leagues applied to play for the national team.

In the first game at EuroBasket 2015, the Dutch beat Georgia 73–72 behind Charlon Kloof's 22 and Worthy de Jong's 16 points.

[7] The Netherlands remaining four games though were all loses, but only by single digits to power houses such as Croatia and Greece.

[9] On 6 October 2022, Radenko Varagić was appointed as interim head coach for the remaining World Cup qualifying campaign.