2018 Asian Games Recap: September 1st
The last day of play at the Asian Games would decided how each team would end up at the end of both men's and women's basketball tournaments. Most importantly, there were medals up for grabs.
Here's the full report of how basketball at the Asian Games wrapped up:
Women's Tournament
Natasha Christaline scored 37 points for Indonesia to help them win seventh place over Mongolia, while Thailand had fifth place taken from them by a late surge from Kazakhstan. Chinese Taipei led Japan by seven points in the bronze medal game, but Japan outscoring them in the second half 50-30, they secured their fourth consecutive bronze medal at the Asian Games.
China opened the final with ten unanswered points, but by the end of the first quarter Korea closed the gap and the remainder of the game was a very close affair. Lifting Korea the most was Lim Yunghui, who had a game-high 24 points, as they went from down by double digits to level at half time. China gave themselves their biggest lead of the game in the third, and hustling well on defence, they successfully protected their advantage. With the final score 71-65 in their favour, China successfully claimed the gold medal.
Men's Tournament
Jamarr Johnson had 23 points and 12 rebounds for Indonesia in their final classification game, but Naoto Tsuji led Japan’s offence with 29 points of his own to win them seventh place. Jordan Clarkson ended his Asian Games campaign with 29 points, winning fifth place for Philippines over Syria by a score of 109-55.
A duel ensued in the bronze medal game between South Korea’s Ricardo Ratliffe (37 points, 12 rebounds) and Chinese Taipei’s Liu Cheng (25 points, 7 rebounds). The Koreans had the better long-distance looks and moved the ball better, which would be enough to survive a late attempt to turn the game around from Chinese Taipei. By a score of 89-81, South Korea earned the bronze medal.
In the final, Iran started off the stronger side, leading China by seven at the end of the first quarter. There was only so far they could go with their close-range accuracy and Hamed Haddadi scoring 27 points and grabbing 10 rebounds. China started the second half rejuvenated, finding the best looks on the floor, particularly from three-point territory, where they made 13 of 22 attempts.
Abudushalamu Abudurexiti would be the scoring hero for China, leading the team with 20 points, while Zhou Qi took care of defence, together they helped China recapture Asian Games gold (their eighth in their history) with a twelve-point win over Iran in the final.
A highly successful tournament for China as they secure the double in both tournaments. For more on all the games of the last three weeks, click to visit official website of the Asian Games 2018.
