The Philippines’ Mighty Sports-Go For Gold yesterday captured the William Jones Cup by defeating Taiwan White 81-71.
The win took the victors’ winning streak to eight games in the tournament, which wrapped up at New Taipei City’s Sinjhuang Stadium over the weekend.
Power forward Eugene Phelps, a California native, led the Mighty Sports to the 10-point victory.
Photo: Lin Cheng-kung, Taipei Times
He put up a double-double of 24 points and 13 rebounds, along with a team high of eight assists, as teammates Mackenzie Moore and Joseph Yeo contributed 16 and 14 points respectively.
The trio put the team halfway to 100 points.
Taiwan White’s best performance came from control guard Jeff Wu, a member of the Formosa Dreamers, who racked up 15 points and six rebounds.
At the final buzzer, the Mighty Sport erupted in celebration. The side replicated their championship performance of 2016 to regain the Jones Cup title, after teams representing Canada won the tournament in 2017 and last year.
The Mighty Sports came up big in the crucial matches, thrashing Iran’s under-23 national team 98-72 in the tournament opener, edging out the South Koreans 89-82 on Tuesday last week and overwhelming Taiwan Blue 97-74 on Saturday.
Although Canada’s teams dominated the cup over the past two years, its representative this year, the UBC Thunderbirds, finished last after Japan steamrolled them 87-78 yesterday.
The UBC Thunderbirds shared last place with Indonesia — both with a record of 1-7 — after Iran thrashed Indonesia 95-53 yesterday.
Yesterday, South Korea took second place by knocking out Taiwan Blue 70-64 at Sinjhuang Stadium.
Taiwan Blue forward Liu Cheng had a team-best 21 points and six rebounds, while Richardo Ratliffe of South Korea put up 20 point and nine rebounds.
On Saturday, Taiwan White beat Indonesia 97-76, while Japan took a 74-51 win against Iran and the UBC Thunderbirds grabbed their only win of the tournament with a narrow 83-79 triumph over Jordan.
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