The Guangdong Southern Tigers defeated the Shandong Hi-Speed Kirin 98-93 in Dongguan, south China’s Guangdong Province, on Saturday, securing their second straight win.
Though Shandong were playing on the road, they were hungry for their sixth win in a row and began the night with remarkable touch, especially from downtown. Jarmar Gulley knocked down five triples for the visitors, including completing a four-point play in the first quarter.
The home team counted on Xu Jie to reply to the opponents’ firepower and he drained five shots behind the arc as well in the first half. Guangdong trailed by five points at 56-51 after the first two quarters.
Xu switched to playmaking mode from the third quarter and his teammates didn’t let him down. Huang Rongqi, Zhang Haojia and Troy Gillenwater combined to launch a 14-0 run for Guangdong to gain the lead. Shandong replied a 7-0 run to stay close. The first quarter ended as the two sides held each other 79-79.
Ren Junfei and Du Runwang took over the scoring duties for the hosts as the fourth quarter began. By contrast, Shandong struggled to make shots and got no more than four points in as long as nine minutes and 39 seconds. When Marquese Chriss finally went to the free throw line and made both of his attempts there, the visitors already trailed 92-85 with two minutes left.
Yu Dehao and Xie Zhijie both made desperate three-pointers for Shandong in the final moments of the game, but Du and Gillenwater didn’t miss any of their four free throws to keep Guangdong’s advantage solid enough to win at home.