Four teams secure spots in the Quarter-Finals

BEIJING (China) - The first four teams booked their tickets to the Quarter-Finals of the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2019, with Argentina, Poland, Serbia and Spain confirming their berths after winning their respective games in the opening day of the Second Round. 

The surprise team of the tournament, Poland continued their magical run with a thrilling 79-74 victory over Russia to climb to an undefeated 4-0 mark in Group I, which was enough to guarantee them a top-two finish in the group table alongside Argentina, who took care of business 87-67 against Venezuela for their fourth consecutive win in the China.

Having qualified for the Quarter-Finals, the Poles are making the most out of their return to basketball's flagship event of basketball after a 52-year absence, last appearing in the FIBA Basketball World Cup 1967 in Uruguay when they finished 5th in a 13-team tournament.

Meanwhile, Serbia and Spain also got the job done early in Group J as they move to identical 4-0 marks to finalize their entry to the next round with victories against Puerto Rico and Italy, respectively. 

With a convincing 90-47 triumph to start the Second Round, Aleksandar Djordjevic's men are following the script as one of the title favorites and continued their phenomenal campaign improving their winning margin over the opponents at 40.8 points over four games.

 
Meanwhile, Spain avoided an Italian upset with a crucial 11-4 run in the fourth quarter to take a 67-60 victory and finalize the list of qualified teams in Wuhan, though the top honors in Group J remain up for grabs and will be decided on Sunday's matchup the undefeated pair.

Similarly, Argentina and Poland will play for first place in Group I.

In the Classification Round 17-32, the tournament hosts China hacked out a thrilling 77-72 victory over Korea in front of a raucous crowd in Guangzhou. The win puts China in a prime spot to take the lone outright Olympic ticket for the Asian region while Iran scraped by a tough Angola side with a 71-62 victory to remain in contention.

There were also wins for Nigeria and Tunisia in their respective assignments, with Nigeria defeating Cote d'Ivoire 83-66 and Tunisia topping the Philippines 86-67 to improve their record to identical 2-2 win-loss cards. 

In action on Saturday, Senegal are not yet out of contention for Africa's lone direct qualification spot too.

FIBA