FIBA Asia - China post win

DOHA (Asian Games) - Asia's top NBA prospect Yi Jianlian claimed 18 points and 14 rebounds as China beat South Korea 68-52 to advance to the semi-finals of the 15th Asian Games.

They will meet Jordan, who came back from an eight-point deficit in the final 30 seconds of regulation to beat Kazakhstan 99-91 in over-time.

Wednesday's other semi-final showdown in the Qatari capital Doha has hosts Qatar facing Iran.

Yasseen Ismail Musa scored eight of his 15 points in the second over-time as Qatar fought off surprise outfit Chinese Taipei 103-96, while Iran beat Japan 68-64 with Hamed Ehadadi collecting 12 points, 15 points and three assists.

Jonas Kazlauskas's China team came into the match against South Korea as favourites despite the Koreans being the defending champions after beating the Chinese in the 2002 final in Busan.

The match also proved to be a marquee billing of two of Asia's top young big men as Yi continually went up against South Korea center Ha Seung Jin, who finished with 16 points and 16 rebounds.

The Koreans' game plan took a major hit three minutes into the match as Bang Sung Yoon re-aggravated an ankle injury which kept him out of the first four matches.

Bang was able to play in Korea's final group match and led the team to victory against Qatar with 42 points, including 12 three-pointers.

Yi was excellent from the beginning scoring from all over the court and Wang Shipeng drilled two three-pointers for a 41-25 half-time advantage.

The Koreans played tough defence in the third period, holding China to just eight points, but Choi Bu Yung's team only bagged 12 and couldn't make up much ground.

Wang Zhizhi, who scored 16 points in the game, took over early in the fourth, scoring 10 straight points as China opened a 59-42 lead. Korea would not get closer than 13 points the rest of the way.

"I'm happy about this game. For the first time, we were under very big pressure. Our opponents didn't start very well in this tournament and in the last game showed a very good game," Kazlauskas said.

"We didn't play bad defence today. And it's good when in tough games under big pressure that you can play big defence. We played good against their three-point shooters."

Kim Seung Hyun added 15 points in a losing cause for South Korea, who next face Kazakhstan in the classification round.

The hosts Qatar meanwhile had all they could handle with Chinese Taipei and needed two extra sessions to beat the eastern Asians as Erfan Ali Saeed scored 27 points and grabbed 15 rebounds while Ali Turki Ali had 20 and Saad Abdulrahman Ali chipped in 19.

Lii Yun Kung's team used the three-ball to pull ahead 35-21 early in the second period. But Malek Salem Abdulla scored eight points in a 10-0 Qatari spurt to close within 35-31.

Joey Stiebing's Qatar would eventually take the lead 51-49 only to see the Taipei sharp-shooters spark the team ahead 73-64 with eight minutes to play.

The hosts held Chinese Taipei score-less for the next 5:25 and Saeed hit a jumper to complete an 8-0 run and pull within 73-72.

Lee Chi Yi had scored eight points in four games of action until the quarter-finals, but he replaced Tseng Wen Ting, who fouled out with 2:18 remaining after collecting 16 points and two blocked shots. And Leed drained a long three-point bomb to give Taipei a 78-73 lead with 1:55 remaining.

Musa's three-point play with 54 seconds left Qatar trailing 80-79. Chen Hsin An made just one of two free throws with 13 seconds left and Saeed drained both of his with 4.5 seconds remaining to force over-time.

Chen Hsin An's back-door cut and lay-up put Chinese Taipei ahead 87-83. With the score even 90-90, Daoud Mousa Daoud buried a jumper with 35 seconds left only to be matched by Lee Hsueh Lin's driving lay-up seconds later.

With five seconds on the clock, Chou Shih Yuan missed both foul shots and Saad Abdulrahman Ali's buzzer beater was off target, sending the game into double over-time 92-92.

Chinese Taipei's shooters were off early in the second extra period and Musa proved too much inside, scoring eight points as Qatar pulled away despite 24 points from Chen Hsin An and 12 points and 19 rebounds from Tien Lei.

"I'm really proud of my guys. They fought, they never gave up. You have to do that to win a championship and hopefully we can carry that over for tomorrow," Stiebing said.

"We wanted to go inside because they had no size able to guard us. And I emphasised to get the ball inside and I thought that Yasseen played unbelievably tough in both of the over-times to get us some baskets."

Earlier in the day, Iran booked their berth in the semi-finals with a 68-64 victory over Japan as Mohammad Samad Nikkhah Bahrami and Mahdi Kamrany each added 14 points for the winners, and Aidin Nikkhah Bahrami chipped in 12 points off the bench.

Fredrick Onica's team survived a 27% (13 of 49) first-half shooting performance to lead 33-25 at the break, mainly because they grabbed more offensive rebounds (19 of 31 total) than Japan had total (18) rebounds, and they forced the Japanese into 12 first half turnovers.

Japan shooting ace Takehiko Orimo heated up in the third quarter, draining three three-pointers in a 16-4 Japan run to pull ahead 41-37.

The Iranians closed the third period strong and went ahead early in the fourth on a three-pointer, 55-47. But Ryota Sakurai scored 14 points in Japan's 17-4 run which left Kimikazu Suzuki's team up 64-59 with 2:21 left to play.

Iran buckled down on defence and Kamrany drained a three-pointer to even the game at 64-64 with 39 seconds left. Following a missed Orimo three-pointer, Mohammad Samad Nikkhah Bahrami made an inside basket with 16 seconds remaining but failed to convert the three-point play.

Shinsuke Kashiwagi missed his three-point attempt with three seconds to play and Ehadadi iced the game with two foul shots with 2.3 seconds left.

"I think our strength is defence. We had a couple breakdowns. But we're young yet. We had some problems rotating on defence but we did our best in contesting their shots. We knew that Orimo was their key player to defend. And I think we did a good job keeping him down," Onica said.

Orimo scored 13 points but took just nine shots while Sakurai led Japan with his 14 points off the bench. Tomoo Amino chipped in 12 points. Despite 10 rebounds from Fumihiko Aono, Japan was out-rebounded 52-37 for the game.

Also on Tuesday, Wesam Alsous made eight free throws in the final 49 seconds to give Jordan a miraculous 99-91 over-time victory over Kazakhstan to set up a semi-final showdown with Qatar.

The 2002 bronze medallists Kazakhstan fell apart in the waning moments, losing an eight-point lead in the final 27 seconds.

Kazakhstan struggled early with controlling the ball and fell behind 13 points late in the first half. Jordan continued to hold Kazakhstan at bay and used Zaid Al Khas's 12 points in the third quarter to pull ahead 59-48 with about three minutes to play in the third.

Alexey Yeropkin's side found their game as Ivan Nechayev buried two three-pointers and Rustam Yargaliyev added six points, including an inside lay-up which gave the Central Asians a 67-65 lead six minutes from time.

Yargaliyev hit another inside lay-up as Kazakhstan opened a 75-69 advantage and his free throw made it 82-74 with 39 seconds remaining.

But Mario Palma's men refused to give in. Fadel Al Najjar grabbed an offensive rebound then drained a three-pointer with 27 seconds left. After a Kazakh turnover, Al Najjar hit a lay-up to cut the deficit to 82-79 with 21 seconds to play.

Yegor Biryulin missed two foul shots with 20 seconds left and Al Najjar was at the line with 10 seconds to play. He made the first one but missed the second, only to see Al Khas grab the offensive rebound and score inside to tie the game with 5.3 seconds to play. The shocked Kazakhs failed to get off a game-winning attempt, sending the game to over-time.

Ahead 87-84, Zaid Abbas stole Biryulin's pass and scored on a break-away dunk with a minute to play. Alsous's two foul shots made it 93-87 with 43 seconds to play. Ponomarev buried a three-pointer and was fouled, completing a four-point play to pull within two points.

Enver Soobzokov made two foul shots then blocked a shot by Yargaliyev with 21 seconds. After two more foul shots from Alsous, Andrey Shpekht missed a three-point attempt with seven seconds and Alsous made two more from the charity stripe to complete the come-back.

"Many people thought the win was impossible. But in basketball, you never lose until the end. I know that because this is not my first battle. I had thousands of battles like this, and I believed we would come back," said Palma, who claimed a series of African Championships as coach of the Angolan national team.

PA Sport