Three years later, the United Arab Emirates made their debut at the top continental competition, the 1993 FIBA Asia Cup.

However, the UAE would lose a narrowly contested match against Iran 73–77, to relegate the team to the classification rounds to finish out the tournament.

[2] After nearly reaching the semi-finals at the first FIBA Asia Cup tournament the UAE took part in, the team was back at the next edition of the event in 1995.

[4] Behind subpar performances at their first two FIBA Asia Cup competitions, the United Arab Emirates entered the tournament in 1997, determined to gain better results.

After completely dominating India, and Bangladesh in their first two preliminary phase matches, the team fell in a close defeat to South Korea 73–72.