MANAMA (Bahrain) - India displayed poise in the endgame to survive the hard-fighting Bahrain, 81-77, and formalize their entry to the FIBA Asia Cup 2025, Saturday night at the Khalifa Sports City.
Clutch plays from Arvind Krishnan and Pranav Prince on both ends of the floor enabled the South Asian side to eke out the all-important win after it coughed up a lead as big as 12 points and trailed by two with 1:54 left.
By showing maturity beyond their years, the charges of Coach Scott Flemming went on to complete a two-game sweep of Group H in the Qualifying Tournament for Third-Place Teams - and got rewarded greatly.
They're the latest from this final qualifying phase to reach FIBA's flagship event in the continent after Chinese Taipei and Guam, who booked their spots after going 1-2 in Group G on Friday in Taipei City.
With this result, the meeting between Bahrain and Iraq - both 0-1 - on Sunday night have now become a virtual knockout for the 16th and last ticket to the August 5-17 showpiece to be held in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
Game heroes: Harsh Dagar starred in the triumph with 28 points on an excellent 6-of-8 clip from beyond the arc as he helped India set the tone early. He also had 3 rebounds, 3 assists, and 2 steals to net an efficiency of 30.
Kanwar Sandhu made his presence felt with 15 points, while the tandem of Prince and Hafeez finished with identical numbers of 11 points and 8 rebounds and combined for a total of 8 assists.
Turning point: India appeared to have regained full control of the match when they built a 62-53 lead entering the fourth quarter, only to allow the home team to rally and get ahead, 77-75, behind Subah Azzam.
Krishnan, however, would show nerves of steel not long after, using a screen before pulling up for a three-pointer from the left wing to give the lead back to themselves, 78-77, with 1:39 remaining.
The young floor general actually committed a turnover moments later but more than made up for it with a crucial steal against Wayne Chism, before Hafeez split his foul shots to extend their lead to a field goal.
The door for a comeback slowly closed for Bahrain afterward. Off a timeout, Prince forced a turnover when he deflected Mosti Rashed's inbound pass intended to Mohammed Ameer, who had the last touch on the ball.
Coach Jad El Hajj's wards had no choice but to foul in an attempt to freeze the clock and hope for misses, but Krishnan made a perfect trip to the line with 11 seconds left to ice the game and settle the final count.
As the buzzer sounded, the team erupted in joy as they brought the country to the Asia Cup for the 11th straight time - a streak that dated back to 2001 which was hosted and eventually won by China.
Stats don't lie: India once again shot impressively from deep by nailing 14 but another major factor behind the win was the way they dominated the rebounding battle, 48-26 - 16 of which came from Palpreet Singh Brar.
They said: "Really proud of our guys, you know, to come in here and win two games when it easily could've gone the other way. This is now our third win in the Asia Cup Qualifiers and these are uncharted areas that we haven't had fora long time in India. It's all about them. I'm just trying to put them in a position to win and they take over from here. We still have things to work on ... really glad, really proud of these guys. We're going to the Asia Cup." - Scott Flemming, Head Coach, India
"We played really hard. The coaches mentioned that we play harder than them for 40 minutes so I think we did that pretty well. We'll try to continue that performance [moving forward]." - Harsh Dagar, Guard, India
"We have one last chance tomorrow. There is no time to be negative or sad or put our heads down. One more game in less than 24 hours. We're still competing to qualify. We're gonna face Iraq, it's gonna be like a Final game. Whoever wins will qualify directly." - Jad El Hajj, Head Coach, Bahrain
"We have to focus for tomorrow. We have another 40 minutes ahead, so we're gonna focus .We'll be together again for the Iraq game. We have one more chance, and we want to take it." - Maitham Isa, Guard, Bahrain
FIBA