BAGHDAD (Iraq) - Pierre Jackson was plug-and-play personified as he powered Sagesse to their breakthrough win in the FIBA West Asia Super League (WASL) following a 90-78 victory over Al Naft on the road on Thursday night at the Al Shaeb Hall in the Iraqi capital.

The renowned veteran guard wasted no time showing his brand of basketball, pouring in 39 points on 65 percent shooting from the field, as he was undeniably the difference that enabled the Lebanese side to improve to 1-1 in Group A of the West Asia League.

Jackson scored 16 in the final period alone as he brought much-needed endgame stability after the home team got to within just three, 71-68, from as much as 14 down.

Game heroes: Radhouane Slimane played a big role as well. The 43-year-old big man finished with a season-high 28 points, alongside 7 rebounds, an assist, a steal, and a block each.

Slimane already had 19 points at the half as he paired up with Jackson to give Sagesse a 48-35 advantage entering the break after trailing by a point after the first quarter.

It was a bounce-back game for the Tunisian star, too. He only had six points in their sub-zone opener loss to Arsalan Kazemi and Shahrdary Gorgan on November 15.

STEP AHEAD Player of the Game: Jackson rightfully earned STEP AHEAD Player of the Game honors as he set a game-high efficiency rating of 34.

Turning point: Al Naft looked poised for a great comeback after Abbas Al-Draiwasai nailed a corner triple and pulled his side to within three, 71-68, with 5:12 to go.

But Jackson buckled down to work afterwards, first by making their Iraqi counterparts pay dearly for not taking care of the ball by sinking a trey of his own to widen their lead to six.

Shortly after, it would be a personal 6-0 run for Jackson as he converted a three-point play to push their lead to 77-68 with 4:31 left to play, and he'd make sure that they remained in control the rest of the way to eventually secure the victory.

Stats don't lie: Jackson's 39 is now the most points scored by a player in a FIBA WASL debut, eclipsing the 34 set by Tyler Wilkerson of Muharraq and Al Wahda's Jomaru Brown.

They said: "He's (Jackson) an amazing player. We are lucky to have him on our team. We suffered, before he arrived, from many things -- how to organize a team, how to control the tempo. Some players were trying alone but, you know, when you have the right point guard it will be different. This is how we looked today." - Jad El Hajj, Head Coach, Sagesse

"After the first loss against Gorgan, it's gonna be very difficult for us to lose another game if we want to qualify for the Final 8. This game was very important for us, we know that there is no easy game, every game is gonna be difficult. The way you're gonna play is gonna decide if it's gonna be easier or harder. The good thing is we opened the game well, and we controlled until the end." - Radhouane Slimane, Sagesse

"Hard luck for us. We played a good game but we fell short. We were not at our best in this game but we look forward to the next games. Sagesse is one of the great clubs in Asia. We are looking ahead to our next games. We identified some errors and we will try to fix them." - Khalid Deroish, Head Coach, Al Naft

"Like Coach said, we played a good game. Unfortunately they shot very well tonight, especially the point guard, Jackson, and the forward. They shot really well from the three. But we'll see them again in Lebanon. We'll be prepared and we'll have a strategy to have a better result for the next time." - Antwaine Wiggins, Al Naft

FIBA