Serbia send strong statement, reach fourth straight Quarter-Finals

MANILA (Philippines) - Serbia rebounded from their first loss at the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023 in emphatic fashion with a 112-79 blowout of Dominican Republic to reach the Quarter-Finals.

Bogdan Bogdnaovic paced Serbia with 20 points after struggling in their loss to Italy to help Serbia secure a top-eight spot for the fourth straight World Cup. The 2014 World Cup runners-up also improved to 2-0 all time against Dominican Republic with the other win coming at the 2020 FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournament Belgrade.

Game Highlights

Turning Point: Serbia wasted no time in taking charge of the game with a 16-2 run in the first quarter for a 26-9 lead. The Europeans added nine straight points early in the second quarter and the gap grew to 20 points. The Dominicans never got back into the game after that.

TCL Player of the Game: Bogdan Bogdanovic made just 1-of-13 three-pointers in Serbia's loss to Italy two days ago and the team leader made sure it wouldn't happen again and he was named the TCL Player of the Game. He poured in 20 points on 3-of-3 three-pointers to go with 5 assists, 3 steals and 1 rebound.

Stats Don't Lie: Serbia shot an unbelievable 88 percent on two-pointers and 66 percent overall, dishing out 29 assists. The Europeans' defense held Dominican Republic to just 43 percent from the field and forced 21 turnovers.

Bottom Line: Serbia can now shift focus to the knockout stage where they will try to reach the Semi-Finals for the third time in the last four World Cups after taking fourth place in 2010 and finishing second in 2014. Serbia's next opponents will be Lithuania. The Dominicans ended up taking fourth place in the Second Round Group I, thereby missing out on improving on their best-ever result, having finished 13th in 2014. The Caribbean nation did book a ticket to the FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournaments.

They Said: "It was a very difficult game for us, playing against a team like Dominican Republic, an offensive minded team, very good on offense. But it was important to show a reaction after the last game (against Italy). The team reacted excellently. It was a very important victory." - Serbia coach Svetislav Pesic

"We are a good team. We had a bad say 13 minutes in the last game (against Italy) that cost us the victory unfortunately. But most importantly we came back. We didn't give up. We showed our quality today and won the game. The last game we didn't shoot very well, today we did. We just have to keep improving and getting better. We know that we have quality but we have to stay humble and go game by game." - Serbia center Nikola Milutinov

"I think we played a very good game from the start. We set our tone and we were up already in the first quarter and we never let up. We kept pressure on their point guards, on their main players. And that was the key to the win." - Serbia forward Vanja Marinkovic

"Congrats to the Serbian team. They dominated the whole game from the beginning - on both sides. We knew that we were playing a country with an amazing history. Of course the pain, pain, pain is too much when you lose. So much. But I am very proud of my players because they gave everything." - Dominican coach Nestor 'Che' Garcia

"This is some of the most fun basketball I have ever played. I had some of the most joy playing with these guys. I know coming here the world just expected us to fall flat on our face and not be a contender and not win games and just be games that are easy ones for people. But we didn't do that at all. We heard the talk and I hope we made our country proud with the way we were able to compete, the way that we fought. And the biggest thing is the way we made the country believe." - Dominican Republic forward Karl-Anthony Towns

Press Conference

 
FIBA