North Korea's Hong In-sun and Choe Kum-hui upset China's plans for a diving sweep at the East Asian Games, upstaging Jia Tong and Yuan Peilin in Monday's 10m synchronized platform final.
China had extended its sequence to four gold in diving when Luo Yutong collected his second title of the meet by leading Chen Jiaming in a Chinese 1-2 finish in the men's 3m springboard.
But Jia and Yuan, leaders after three rounds, admitted they were unprepared for the North Korean women.
PHOTO: AP
"We haven't competed against North Korea before. We were nervous and made some mistakes we shouldn't have," said Yuan, a 13-year-old who beat Olympic champion Li Ting at last month's national games.
Despite that setback, China continued to dominate the medal standings, winning four of the first 10 medals awarded on day three and boosting its total to 25.
The other titles were more evenly divided than Sunday's program, when China (21) and host Macau (6) shut out the competition.
Tiny Macau, which had only earned one gold in three previous East Asian Games, held onto second place with 20 medals overall.
South Korea overtook Taiwan for third place, with Kang Hee-won and Gye Min-young capturing the men's and women's singles bowling titles, and Wushu athlete Lee Seung-kuen winning the nanquan, or fist fighting, final.
Japan and Taiwan gained their first gold medals of the Games in men's and women's teams soft tennis finals.
Taiwan beat China 79-56 in women's basketball preliminaries and then took the hot favorite Chinese men to the wire, eventually losing by three points after seven lead changes.
NBA prospect Yi Jianlian had 18 points and 10 rebounds, while Wang Shipeng scored 21 points as the Chinese men held on for a 68-65 win and extended their run here to 3-0. In a women's grudge match, South Korea beat North Korea 72-62.
Mongolia was against Hong Kong and Japan faced Macau in later men's basketball matches.
The Chinese maintained their momentum in weightlifting, adding the men's 69 kg and women's 53 kg titles to the three gold medals from Sunday, although there was nobody close to a record.
Yang Lian's world record lift at clean-and-jerk in the women's 48 kg division had given China its first gold medal on Sunday.
China has also been the dominant force in Wushu and expected more gold medals in the last five Wushu finals later Monday.
Chen Min became a multiple Wushu winner in the morning session, adding the Changquan title to her earlier win in the all around competition.
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