Oscar Kao on Tuesday night breathed new life into the Hsinchu JKO Lioneers, leading the team to a 109-85 victory over the Kaohsiung Steelers to snap their four-game losing streak.
Kao, who beat the buzzer with a three-pointer from half-court in the third quarter, called the win a good omen for the new captain.
“The victory today is a good sign for me as the new captain... The captaincy means not just recognition, but more responsibility,” Kao said after the game.
Photo: CNA
The Lioneers reached the P.League+ Finals last season, in which they fell to the Taipei Fubon Braves 4-1, but a slow start to this season and criticism that they were too dependent on foreign players convinced the club to change course.
Prior to Tuesday’s game, the 4-6 Lioneers released a short video on Instagram to announce that Kao had been unanimously selected as the team’s new leader.
On Dec. 16, the Lioneers announced what they called “a tough decision” to part ways with their imported big man Sim Bhullar, part of a strategy to let younger local players “shoulder more responsibility,” it said.
The 2.26m Bhullar, who now plays for the T1 League’s Tainan TSG Ghosthawks, had been a key part of the team, averaging 18.3 points a game and 15 rebounds in his six games with the Lioneers this season, after averaging 26.3 points and 20.8 rebounds per game last season.
However, the Indian Canadian’s absolute dominance on the court drew criticism that the Lioneers relied too much on Bhullar and other foreign players, with some of the critics mocking the Lioneers as the “Simchu Bhullarneers.”
Against this backdrop, Kao’s ascension to captain made sense, and was even inevitable to many.
After he starred for the Lioneers in the 2020-2021 season, earning Rookie of the Year, the team last year rewarded him with a five-year NT$35 million (US$1.14 million) deal that made him one of the highest paid players in Taiwanese professional basketball history.
In his first season under the contract, Kao made the league’s All-Defensive Team.
Still, the Lioneers did not see as much improvement as they had hoped for in Tuesday’s game.
Kao had only nine points for 3-12, and the two Lioneers “imports” who played — Terrico White and William Artino — accounted for 52.3 percent (55 points) of the team’s 105 points.
During the Lioneers’ previous four games, their foreign players contributed 144 of the team’s 317 points (45.4 percent). That rises to 52.1 percent if the 21 points from Nigerian Ifeanyi Eboka are included.
Eboka is technically not an import player, because he joined the league after graduating from Shih Hsin University.
It was the Lioneers’ first game with a healthy roster this season, head coach Greg Lin said, adding that they were glad to get 13 points from Hsiao Shun-yi and Chu Yun-hao.
Chu, the first overall pick in last year’s draft, nailed all three of his three-point attempts in the fourth quarter.
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