Thursday, November 25, 2004

Stankovic Cup Day 5 – One more surprise, Korea routs Taiwan by 19

One more surprise before moving on to the next stage. One day after a shocking loss to India, South Korea got back their shooting touch and routed Taiwan 94-75 on its home court, thus bumping India out of the Stankovic Cup semifinal.

With three upsets in two nights, suddenly the Stankovic Cup provided all the drama as expected. Six of eight teams finished the preliminary round with 2-1. You have Japan surprising Qatar, India edging Korea, and finally Korea stomping Taiwan by 19 points.

Which pretty much tells you that anything can happen in the next two days.

Cho Sung-min scored 15 points, including Korea’s last 12 points, en route to a game-high 29 points. Korean had five players scoring in double-figure and shot an impressive 12 of 25 three-pointers in a physical and exciting game.

Korea used a 17-0 run in the second quarter and a 16-0 run spanning from late third to early fourth quarter to secure the victory. It’s interesting because they didn’t look like a team which lost to India the night before at all.

Chen Hsin-an once again was the only one Taiwan NT could go to tonight. Chen shot 10-for-18 from the field and led Taiwan with 23 points. His teammates simply couldn’t throw a basket in the ocean. Taiwan NT was 5-for-26 from the three.

Although Taiwan still led Group A, head coach Hu Tsai-lin was all sorry after the game for letting the fans down.

Chen Hsin-an scored 10 of Taiwan’s first 11 points in the game as Taiwan led 22-11 after six minutes and 29-24 in the end of the first quarter. 202cm F/C Wu Dai-hao had seven points in the opening period.

Korean’s hot shooting and Taiwan’s inability to score during the first seven minutes in the second quarter set the tone for the game. Korea pulled away with a 17-0 run.

Taiwan made a run for its own. Chen Hsin-an and Tien Lei combined 13 points in a 19-7 thrid quarter run as Taiwan took the lead, 62-61, with 2:20 to go in the third. But Korea scored the next five points to start the game-deciding 16-0 run.

■Day 5 Game Summary
Korea 94-75 Taiwan (Half 49-43)
Korea – Cho Sung-min 29p, No Kyoung-suk 14p, Kang Eun-sik 13p, Kim Tae-sul 11p, Kim Dong-uk 11p
Taiwan – Chen Hsin-an 23p+6rb, Chang Chi-feng 12p, Tien Lei 11p+6rb

Japan 106-46 Philippines (Half 59-18)
Japan – T. Amino 19p, S. Furuta 14p+6rb, S. Ito 14p+6rb, K. Takeuchi 8p+13rb, J. Takeuchi 4p+11rb, K. Igarashi 13p, R. Sakurai 12p
Philippines – M. Bara 11p

India 71-63 Kuwait (Half 38-29)
India – S. Kumar 21p, S. Robinson 14p+18rb+6a+3s+6blk
Kuwait – O. Mubarak 24p+9rb+5blk, A. Albrahim 14p+6rb+4a

■Final Preliminary Standings
Group A
Taiwan 2-1
Korea 2-1
India 2-1
Kuwait 0-3
(Tie-breaker – Point differential: Taiwan +18, Korea +14, India -32)

Group B
Syria 2-1
Qatar 2-1
Japan 2-1
Philippines 0-3
(Tie-breaker – Point differential: Syria +15, Qatar +6, Japan -21)

■Day 6 Schedule
India(A3) vs. Philippines(B4)
Japan(B3) vs. Kuwait(A4)
Semi: Korea(A2) vs. Syria(B1)
Semi: Taiwan(A1) vs. Qatar(B2)