Philippines without surprises in the final round of Group A at the FIBA World Cup. Italy won 90:83 and continues the competition and fight for a medal.
Before this match, the Philippines needed a victory of 12 or more points to advance.
Tradition has it that Italy has so far played 11 games at the FIBA World Championships against selections from Asia and won all 11 of them.
Italy are Second Round bound! โ #FIBAWC x #WinForItalia ๐ฎ๐น
— FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023 ๐ (@FIBAWC) August 29, 2023
The tradition continued after this match. Quality simply came to the fore. The Philippines was competitive until the middle of the second quarter. Then Italy went to a double-digit advantage, and at halftime they had nine points more.
In the third quarter, they had the largest advantage of 15 points and it seems that they broke the match there. The local basketball players tried until the end to achieve a turnaround, but they were not even close. In other words, they managed to come within seven points of the deficit at the end of the match.
Simone Fontecchio led Italy to victory with 18 points, two fewer were given by Gaiampaolo Ricci. Marco Spissu and Stefano Tonut scored 13 each. Jordan Clarkson led the home team with 23 points, and Dwight Ramos scored 14 goals.
Finally, in group A, the first selection is the Dominican Republic (3-0), the second is Italy (2-1), the third is Angola (2-1) and the fourth is the Philippines (0-3). The Dominican Republic and China continue the competition with the two ranked teams of Group B, while Angola and the Philippines will play for the 17th to 32nd places.