Chinese-Taipei burns Gilas from deep, Yi-less China drops to 1-2 and other Day #3 highlights

PRELIMINARY ROUND GAME RESULTS (August 3):

(Group C) Korea def. Malaysia 80-56

(Group D) Kazakhstan def. India 80-67

(Group B) Qatar def. Hong Kong 87-64

(Group C) Iran def. China 70-51

(Group D) Bahrain def. Thailand 86-62

(Group A) Chinese-Taipei def. PHILIPPINES 84-79

(Group A) Jordan def. Saudi Arabia 67-43

Second Round Groupings:

MALL OF ASIA ARENA, Pasay City—So many of us are still reeling from that stinging defeat Gilas Pilipinas suffered against Chinese-Taipei in the final day of the preliminary round of the 27^th FIBA-Asia Championship here.

The Taiwanese set the hardwood ablaze in the first period; connecting on 6/7 three-point field goals and if it were not for the timely retaliations by Philippine forward Ranidel de Ocampo from sitance, the RP quintet would have had to climb out of a deeper hole than the 30-19 score after one. But thanks to the spark provided by Gilas skipper Jimmy Alapag in the second quarter, the Philippines did inch back to gain the halftime edge 43-42.

Reserve swingman Larry Fonacier began converting in the third period and the Taiwanese could not keep up with the Philippines’ torrid offense and fell behind, 68-55 entering the final canto.

Then it happened.

The first quarter storm imposed by the Taiwanese on Gilas came back to life as the perimeter defenses of the Filipinos began showing cracks as Taipei point-forward Lin Chih-Chieh, power forward Lu Cheng Ju and back-up pivot Tseng Wen-Ting joined forces to outshoot and outhustle the host nation, and by the time Tseng hit a miraculous fall-away bank shot from beyond the arc, the Philippines could not respond as Chinese-Taipei silenced the sell-out crowd at this venue with an 84-79 triumph over the locals, altering the course and plans of Coach Chot Reyes and the stunned nationals.

“They executed in the fourth quarter and we didn’t,” a disgruntled Alapag said after the loss. “It’s a long tournament—a marathon, not a sprint. We’ll use the break (August 4) to refocus and play harder in the second round.”

“Their shots just kept falling,” Gilas forward Marc Pingris told me, in the vernacular. “It was disheartening to see triple after triple go in, even the contested ones.”

Taiwanese reserve forward Douglas Creighton goes a little deeper.

“The game against Saudi (Arabia) helped us a lot in terms of finding our shots and getting comfortable with the venue,” he said before leaving the venue. “Lu and Lin carried what they got from the Saudi game to today. They really shot well.

“When we were behind coming into the fourth, we just had to remind ourselves that we still had an entire quarter to go and thirteen points is nothing with that much time left.”

He was right. Chinese-Taipei outscored the Philippines 29-11 in the fourth period and iced their margin from the free throw line. The Taiwanese went 15/30 from deep for 50% shooting from three-point range—a sick rate.

“First of all, I want to apologize to our countrymen in Taiwan," Reyes spoke during the postgame press conference. "We know that they have been victims of a lot of abuse. We really wanted to dedicate this game to them but unfortunately it didn’t turn out. I should have done a better job in rotating and pacing our players. We spent a lot of energy in our chase and we didn’t have that energy in the end so that’s the story of the ball game.”

The loss meant that the Philippines enters the second round as the fourth seed and must sweep all their assignments and hope that Chinese-Taipei drops two outings to have at least a shot at reclaiming the top spot and face off in against the fourth seed coming out of the opposite group in the knockout quarterfinal round. It will be tough, considering that the teams from Group B are composed of undefeated Qatar—reinforced by new naturalized player (and former NBA lottery pick) Jarvis Hayes—the dangerous Japan and newbie Hong Kong.

At present pace, the Philippines is on a collision course with defending titlist China, unless things also shake up in Group F.

For China, it has so far been a tournament to forget as they lost on opening day to rival Korea and got a royal drubbing from the very formidable Iranians, 70-51.

NBA veteran Yi Jianlian sat out his second consecutive game after scoring a team-high 23 markers in the opening day loss against the Koreans. Yi is said to be suffering from “several” injuries that he was not even used during China’s walloping of Malaysia in that 91-point win yesterday. Many observers feel—because of the apparent light nature of the Group F match-ups against Kazakhstan, Bahrain and India—that Yi might even return to action when the quarterfinals begin. That will be almost a full week’s rest.

Iran showed a lot of flaws when the Chinese tried to stage a rally in the second half, though. Superstar bigs Samad Nikkhah-Bahrami and Hamed Hadadi began succumbing to the airtight Chinese defenses, prompting international broadcaster Alex Compton to comment, “If any of these two teams lose one or two of their stars, they become so beatable.”

To round out the action to close the prelims, Kazakhstan and Qatar joined Iran as being undefeated heading into the second round as they posted convincing triumphs over India and Hong Long, respectively. Korea bounced back from the loss to Iran with an 80-58 win over winless Malaysia while Jordan finally broke into the win column as they successfully trounced Saudi Arabia in the final game of the day.

Over at the Ninoy Aquino Stadium in Manila, Bahrain’s naturalized American CJ Giles allegedly sustained an injury to his ailing left knee that required medical staff to bring him to the hospital as the Bahrainis sent Thailand packing via an 86-62 victory. As of this writing, Giles’ condition is still uncertain for the second round, but I’ll update you all once I get word.

The second round begins on Monday (August 5) and the way the two groups have been thrown together makes it very interesting how strategies will play out at this stage. Finishing at the top of the Group E suddenly might not be an advantage as China is lurking as a possible fourth seed—due to their dismal showing so far—and Kazakhstan has also been impressive. The loss to Chinese-Taipei might actually have been a blessing in disguise for the Philippines, because of the positional developments in Group F. It now comes down to who we want to face in the knockout stages.

“We prefer Korea over China,” a Gilas member said. “Kazakhstan even looks stronger than them, so it will be an interesting second.”

See you guys on Monday. At this point of the competition, I’ll borrow a term from poker that was created when an unknown accountant from Tennessee went on to become the 2003 world champion; beating a bunch of iconic pros along the way: “Anyone can win.”

The plot thickens.

Spotted at the games: Derek Ramsey, Edu Manzano, Chris Tiu, Lia Cruz, Coach Joe Lipa, Coach Nic Jorge, Cong. Robbie Puno, Vic Sotto, Sen. Tito Sotto.

BOX SCORES

PR-C: Korea def. Malaysia, 80-58

KOR 80—Lee Seung 18, Lee Jong 12, Cho 11, Moon 10, Kim Joo 7, Kim Min 6, Yoon 5, Kim Jong 4, Kim Sun 4, Kim Tae 3, Yang 0, Choi 0.

MAS 58—Kuek 25, Gan 10, Ooi 5, Soo 5, Foong 4, Wong C. 4, Choo 3, Ng 2, Tong 0, Wong W. 0, Mak 0.

PR-D: Kazakhstan def. India, 80-67

KAZ 80—Yevstigneyev 21, Johnson 16, Yargaliev 13, Ponomarev 11, Lapchenko 8, Klimov 6, Zhigulin 3, Bondarovich 2, Sultanov 0, Murzagaliev 0.

IND 67—Bhriguvanshi 19, Grewal 14, Jo. Singh 10, Bharama 8, Amr. Singh 4, Amj. Singh 4, Y. Singh 4, P. Singh 2, Arj. Singh 1, Pethani 0.

PR-B: Qatar def. Hong Kong 87-64

QAT 87—Hayes 25, Daoud 17, A. Ali 8, Abdi 7, Mo. Abdullah 7, Saeed 5, M. Mohammed 5, S. Ali 4, Elhadary 3, Ma. Abdullah 3, B. Mohammed 3, Musa 0.

HKG 64—Chan S. 18, Wong 9, Fong 8, Reid 8, Lau Tsza 8, Li 4, Lau Tung 4, Lee 3, Lam 2, Chan 0, Szeto 0.

PR-C: Iran def. China, 70-51

IRI 70—Hadadi 15, Sahakian 13, Afagh 12, Nikkhah-Bahrami 10, Kardoust 6, Sohrabnejad 6, Kamrany 3, Davoudichegani 3, Veisi 2, Davari 0, Arghavan 0, Jamshidijafarabadi 0.

CHN 51—Wang S. 11, Wang Zhizhi 9, Li 6, Wang Zhelin 6, Liu 6, Zhou 6, Zhu 4, Guo 3, Sun 0, Chen 0, Zhang 0.

PR-D: Bahrain def. Thailand, 86-62

BRN 86—Alderazi 21, Giles 18, M. Kawaid 12, Ismaeel 11, Altawash 11, Akber 9, Azzam 4, Malabes 0, Y. Kawaid 0.

THA 62—Lertmalaipron 11, Lertlaokul 11, Klaewnarong 9, Tongsri 6, Darunpong Apiromvilaichai 6, Dasom 5, Darongpan Apiromvilaichai 5, Ghogar 4, Klahan 3, Kongkum 2, Samerjai 0.

PR-A: Chinese-Taipei def. PHILIPPINES, 84-79

TPE 84—Lu 22, Lin 20, Tien 18, Tseng 16, Davis 6, Yang 2, Lee 0, Chen 0, Creighton 0, Tsai 0, Hung 0.

PHI 79—Fonacier 21, Douthit 16, de Ocampo 13, William 11, Norwood 9, Alapag 9, David 0, Chan 0, Aguilar 0, Pingris 0, Tenorio 0.

PR-A: Jordan def. Saudi Arabia, 63-47

JOR 63—Baxter 15, Al-Sous 11, Zaghab 10, Hadrab 9, Alhamaresheh 6, Abu Ruqayah 5, Abuqoura 3, Abdeen 2, Aldwairi 2, Al-Najjar 0, Alfaraj 0, Hussein 0.

KSA 47—A. Almuwallad 16, Mo. Almarwani 14, Kabe 6, Alhawsawi 5, M. Alumwallad 5, Ma. Almarwani 1, Abo Jalas 0.

Follow Noel Zarate on Twitter (@NoelZarate) and email sportztackle@yahoo.com