Daiki Tanaka heats up in second half to get Alvark back to Semi-finals

BANGKOK (Thailand) - Alvark Tokyo rebound from heartbreaking loss to beat Hyundai Mobis Phoebus, 90-81. The win gets Alvark a trip back to the FIBA Asia Champions Cup Semi-finals after making it to the title game last year.

Newcomer Milan Mačvan had his best game yet with 20 points and 10 rebounds to help Alvark Tokyo get the crucial victory.

Both teams headed into the game well aware what was at stake in this particular game. Coming in with identical 1-1 records in Group B, they both needed a win to advance to the next round. This resulted in a fiery start where neither team held a lead of over 6 in the first half, with the lead changing hands 8 times.

Mačvan hit a three-point buzzer-beater, giving Alvark a 5-point lead and momentum heading into the halftime break.

It was a big enough cushion for Alvark to withstand another second half barrage of three-pointers from Hyundai’s Oh Yong-Jun. The sharpshooter knocked down 7 three-pointers in yesterday’s win over Guangdong and fired away for 5 triples in the second half to finish with 15 points. Ra Guna was also unstoppable as usual with 24 points on 10-16 shooting and 17 rebounds.

(Oh Yong-Jun)

Alvark rode a balanced attack in the second half, finishing the game with 5 players in double-digit scoring. Asia Champions Cup 2018 MVP Daiki Tanaka also went off for his best game of this year’s tournament, scoring 16 points with 12 in the second half. It’s his highest scoring total so far, after putting up 7 points in both previous games.

“I was just really going through [the first] two games, going back to my old self,” Tanaka said after the game. “Remembering how I have played in the last couple years. I was really trying to go aggressively on the offensive end to advance to the Semi-finals.”

(Daiki Tanaka)

Alvark Tokyo finished second-place in Group B, setting up a Semi-finals clash with Naft Abadan. The recent champions from Iran has Arsalan Kazemi, who was on the Petrochimi squad that beat Alvark Tokyo last year in the title game.

“It’s going to be a tough game for sure and we’ll be prepared to play a tough team,” added Tanaka.

“It would have been better for us if we could have finished in first place,” Alvark coach Luka Pavicevic added. “These are really great opportunities to face adversities. We have met the strongest team in the tournament in our group which are the Chinese champions, Lebanese champions, and Korean champions. After this, I think the Iranian champions are most component ones and we will try to rise to the occasion and be competitive in that game.”

(Coach Luka Pavicevic)

The cast for Alvark Tokyo has been highly productive once again at the FIBA Asia Champions Cup 2019. Joji Takeuchi is averaging 8.3 points and 7.7 rebounds per game, while off-season addition Yutaroh Suda is producing a highly impressive 10.7 points per contest as well.

Teams will be getting one day of rest on September 27 before the semi-finals commence on September 28.

FIBA