The defending FIBA Asia Champion, China settled for Fifth-Place finish in the 27th FIBA Asia Men’s Basketball Championship defeating Qatar with the final score at 96-85, on Sunday at the Mall of Asia Arena.
China outscored the Qataris with a 25-15 to turn a slim 45-40 halftime lead into a 70-55 advantage during the third quarter of the Qatar vs. China. China’s young point guard Guo Ailun teamed up with veteran campaigner center Wang Zhizhi in the third quarter to help pull away against Qatar.
Qatar made their own response and rallied in the final quarter but they were not able to cut the lead down below double digits. The closest they could get was when they were down by just 11 points, Qatar failed to hit key baskets to recover.
China’s guard Guo finished with 21 points and 5 (–foul word(s) removed–)ists to power China while Qatar’s point guard Masour Elhadary led all scorers with 23 points for Qatar, his team mate Baker Mohamed contributed with 22 points. China’s balanced scoring made the difference for the team.
Qatar, who lost to Korea in the quarterfinals before beating Kazakhstan in their cl(–foul word(s) removed–)ification game last night, finished the biennial tournament in sixth place.
The scores:
CHINA 96 – Guo 21, Wang Shipeng 14, Wang Zhizhi 13,, Yi 12, Zhu 10, Wang Zhelin 9, Zhou 8, Sun 3, Liu 2
QATAR 85 – Elhadary 23, Mohammed 22, Saad 13, Mohamed 13, Daoud 5, Saleem Malek 3, Abdi 2, Ali 2, Saleem Mohammed 2
Quarter-scoring: 20-21, 45-40, 70-55, 96-85
