Lin “the Beast” Chih-jeh’s go-ahead basket off a fierce drive to the hoop with seven seconds left in the game gave Taiwan a 90-89 lead over Team Guan Hua as the national team went on to win by the same score at the Sinjhuang Sports Complex in New Taipei City last night to improve to 4-1.
The Taiwanese team captain proved his worth as he netted 15 of his team-high 24 points in a decisive fourth to lift the national team past their Taiwanese brethrens in one of their closest Jones Cup matches in recent years.
The win not only spared Taiwan what would have been an embarrassing defeat at the hands of the “second team,” it also kept the hosts in contention as they look to finish off the tournament strong with three tough matches to go.
“We knew it would be tough for us and the result definitely showed that,” Taiwanese head coach Hsu Jin-tseh said.
He nearly got bested by Guan Hua for sitting out his top two centers Tseng Wen-ding and Quincy Davis in what many thought would be an easy win.
Guan Hua surprised all by taking a 16-13 lead after one quarter of play and led it 42-41 at the half before building a 70-65 advantage through the third quarter.
After Liu Cheng’s three-pointer gave Guan Hua a 79-72 lead with less than five minutes remaining, the Beast took control of the game and scored the 15 points needed to secure the win.
USA 88, EGYPT 83
Team USA needed a strong fourth quarter to fend off a tough Egyptian squad in the first game in Sinjhuang yesterday afternoon.
What should have been a relatively easy win for the Americans turned into a dog fight as Egypt outscored their counterparts in the second quarter 25-to-20 to force a 50-all draw at the half and hung with the Americans in an evenly fought third before succumbing in the fourth.
SOUTH KOREA 67, JORDAN 57
South Korea bounced back from a tough loss to Iran the night before with a win over Jordan to improve to 5-1 for the tournament.
After allowing South Korea to take an early 18-6 lead, Jordan quickly found their range as they played the favorites shoulder-to-shoulder the rest of the way.
IRAN 60, JAPAN 55
Winless Japan continued their struggle in this year’s competition by dropping a 60-55 decision to unbeaten Iran last night.
Skipper Mehmed Becirovic did not have top shooter Mohammad Samad Nikkhah Bahrami’s services for the game due to injury.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier