The silver medalist of the FIBA Asia 2011, Team Jordan secured the last ticket to the knockout stages of FIBA Asia 2013 after they rallied with a victory over Japan in Group E with the final score at 65-56 on Wednesday at the Mall of Asia Arena.
Jordan, the team that was defeated by Chinese Taipei and the Philippines in the second round made a comeback in the tournament after they defeated Hong Kong and Japan recently. Naturalized player Jimmy Baxter topscored for Jordan against Japan with his 16 points performance. Mohammed Hussein also scored the best game of his career as he finished with 15 points and 19 rebounds from off the bench.
The Jordanian national team finished the Group stages with a 2-4 record, good enough to give them fourth place and a seat in the crossover quarterfinals against Group F leader and undefeated team Iran in Group F.
Jordan’s matchup against arch-rival Iran will mark the third straight time that the two nations will face off in the playoffs for the Asian championship. In 2009, Iran easily defeated Jordan in the semifinals but during the 2011 edition of the game, Jordan made a huge upset against Iran and eventually making it to the finals of the competition and eliminated Iran in the finals of FIBA Asia.
Japan will miss the FIBA Asia 2013 playoffs round with just one win after the first two rounds of the competition. They will move into the cl(–foul word(s) removed–)ification pool to battle other eliminated teams from the second round of FIBA Asia 2013.
