RP cagers bow to lowly Kuwaitis

From worse to worst.

That’s where the Philippines has gone to in the Asian Basketball Confederation men’s basketball championship with a 66-79 loss to Kuwait yesterday guaranteeing the country’s worst showing in the 43-year history of the biennial meet.

With a second straight defeat in the consolation round, the best the Filipino cagers can target now is 13th place.

And that will only come if the Philippines beats Syria today. Otherwise, the RP squad will be relegated to a playoff for 15th place in this 16-nation event.

The problem is that Syria could turn out to be a dangerous opponent as it defeated Hong Kong, 109-77, yesterday.

A day after losing to Hong Kong, the Filipinos stumbled anew against the Kuwaitis and saw their hopes of matching their 11th place finish in Fukuoka, Japan in 1999 vanish into thin air.

Before this year, the Filipinos’ previous worst finish was 12th in Seoul, Korea in 1995. The team was then handled by coach Arlene Rodriguez.

Ricky Calimag, Dennis Madrid and Richard Melencio tried to carry the fight for the embattled Filipinos, who led in the early minutes of the contest. They failed.

Calimag topscored for the Filipinos with 17 points on 5-of-9 field goal shooting in 32 minutes on the floor. Madrid added 14 points while Melencio contributed 11. Marc Pingris has 10 points and 11 rebounds.

Abdullahna Alsarraf led the Kuwaitis with 27 points and seven rebounds.