Serbia steamroll Puerto Rico, stamp status as title contenders

MANILA (Philippines) - Serbia solidified their status as serious title contenders of the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023 as they steamrolled Puerto Rico 94-77 for two wins in two games in Group B.

 

All 11 Serbian players who played scored - Filip Petrusev did not appear in the game - to help Serbia improve to 5-0 all-time against Puerto Rico - all of the games coming since 2016, including a 90-47 win in the Second Round of the 2019 World Cup.

 
Turning point: The game was pretty much over once it started as the Serbians scored the first eight points, and they pushed the lead to 18 points in the first quarter. Puerto Rico fell behind by as many as 32 points (53-21) but Puerto Rico at least made things interesting by trimming the gap to 81-71 with 5 minutes left. Serbia answered with a 13-2 run and the gap was back to 21 points with about 1 minute to play.

TCL Player of the Game: Serbia wasted little time in racing away from Puerto Rico and a major reason was Nikola Jovic. The 20-year-old scored 11 of his 17 points in the first quarter and he also collected 4 assists and 3 rebounds.

Stats Don't Lie: Serbia shot 52 percent from the field, including 64 percent on two-pointers. The Europeans also limited Puerto Rico to just 36 percent shooting, including 33 percent inside the three-point line.

Bottom Line: Serbia improved to 2-0 but they still have to wait to book their ticket to the Second Round as they face debutants South Sudan in their final game of the group on Wednesday August 30. Puerto Rico certainly have something to prove after this loss and will look to bounce back when they take on China later Wednesday in the final game of the group.

They Said: "I agree with what Nikola (Jovic) said. Puerto Rico is a transition team. They showed that in the second half. This is the main quality of the Puerto Rico team. If they run they have good rhythm on offense and make 10 three-pointers in the second half. Of course they have pride and had a good reaction in the second 20 minutes, which is what we expected, I must say. How we played the first 20 minutes was excellent. You cannot play better than how we played." - Serbia coach Svetislav Pesic

"I want to wish our coach a happy birthday. I hope he had a special birthday, especially because we won. In the first half we did exactly what the coaching staff wanted. We did a great job defending them. They scored only 27 points and we were great on offense. The second half was not great for us. We did exactly the opposite. They made a lot of threes. The result is great because we won but I would not say that we are that happy." - Serbia forward Nikola Jovic

"After a great first half we maybe underestimated them in the third quarter. That's when they made a run. That could be a positive thing - maybe some adversity for us because I don’t think it's good to beat everybody by 40. We gotta learn from this. We will not overthink what happened today. But we should avoid what happened in the third quarter." - Serbian center. Dusan Ristic

"We came out really strong. We were up by 30 at halftime. And then we had a little fall in the third quarter because they are a good team and they made shots that they missed in the first half. It got down to 10 points. I think that is a good thing that happened to us because we had it easy against China and then the first half. This will keep us on the ground and stay humble so we can keep playing better and better." - Serbia forward Vanja Marinkovic

"Tough game. It was two games for us. First half we started flat and with no energy. They made a lot of threes and we didn't stop the ball. They scored easy points in transition. Against a team like this it's tough. In the second half we were more composed and tried to get back into the game and fight, Don't give up second shots, stop the ball in transition. At the end of the day it's not enough to beat a team like Serbia. But we saw the effort and the energy. This is something positive that we have to take with us to the next game." - Puerto Rico coach Nelson Colon

"We were two different teams out there. In the first half we didN't have any energy. We weren't making shots, weren't moving the ball on offense. When that happens, it's hard to get stops. They're not taking the ball out, we can't set up our defense. In the second half we started making shots and moving the ball a little. We were more active on defense, more active on offense. And it shows." - Puerto Rico forward Isaiah Pineiro

Press conference:

 

The game report will be updated shortly. Check back soon for Game Highlights.

FIBA