The first German presence in the European Basketball Championship was at EuroBasket 1951 in Paris. West Germany finished the preliminary round with a (1–2) record, finishing in third place in their group. They were again (1–2) in the first classification round, but this combined with a three-way tie-breaker put them second in that group. They then lost the classification 9th–12th place game and the 11th/12th game to finish in 12th place in the then 18 team tournament