After a failure to take advantage of a technical foul by Kazakhstan in the fourth quarter that could have been a five-point turnaround, Taiwan’s men’s basketball team fell to a 74-68 defeat in their opener at the Asian Games in Incheon, South Korea, yesterday afternoon.
What should have been a fairly easy win for Taiwan against the underdogs, who had won two of their three games in qualifying to make Group C, turned into an uphill battle from the get-go, with Kazakhstan nailing over half of their field goals in the opening quarter to lead Taiwan 23-14.
Even though Taiwan rediscovered their shooting range in the second quarter to keep it close, it did not stop the central Asians from claiming a 40-30 advantage at halftime, with Anatoliy Kolesnikov scoring more than 10 points in the first half alone to account for a sizable chunk of his team’s total offense.
Photo: Wang Yi-sung, Taipei Times
Eight quick points by Lu Cheng-ju in the third quarter, coupled with a pair of turnovers by Kazakhstan, slashed the double-digit deficit to as little as four points late in the third quarter, but two questionable calls by the officials that ended center Tseng Wen-ting’s day early, while tagging skipper Hsu Chin-che with a technical foul, proved too much for Taiwan to overcome in the decisive fourth as they fell short by half a dozen points to a taller Kazakhstan lineup.
Tseng’s early departure and Kazakhstan’s 39-30 edge in rebounds further exposed the absence of naturalized center Quincy Davis, who was pronounced ineligible by Games officials prior to the competition for failing to satisfy the minimum three-year residence requirement.
Davis was instrumental in helping Taiwan beat China twice in the past two years, at last year’s FIBA Asia Championship and this year’s Asia Cup.
Taiwan get a day off today to prepare for a showdown against China tomorrow afternoon in a must-win game.
It will be another uphill battle for Taiwan with Davis off the roster as they look to counter China’s size advantage with superior speed and perhaps an improved three-point attack.
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