Turkoglu helps Turkey remain perfect
September 1, 2010
ANKARA, Turkey (AP)—Host Turkey maintained its perfect record at thebasketball world championship by narrowly beating Puerto Rico 79-77 Wednesday,despite trailing its rival in the first three quarters.
Hidayet Turkoglu of Phoenix Suns led Turkey (4-0) with 16 points and ErsanIlyasova(notes) of the Milwaukee Bucks had double-double with 13 points and 13 reboundsas the host team pulled away in the last quarter.
Puerto Rico (1-3), which desperately needed a win to guarantee a spot in thesecond round, squandered a three-quarter lead over Turkey.
“We won when the Puerto Ricans began to get tired physically,” saidTurkey’s assistant coach Orhun Ene. “If we can eliminate our mistakes than wecan be more successful in the upcoming rounds. We will play China next. We wantto win every match.”
Angel Vassalo scored a game-high 19 points for Puerto Rico, which facesIvory Coast on Thursday. And Puerto Rico’s 2.20-meter Peter Ramos also haddouble-double with 15 points and 12 rebounds.
“We got one chance to qualify tomorrow,” said Puerto Rico coach ManoloCintron in reference to the Ivory Coast game.
Puerto was more successful than Turkey from every spot but Turkey commandedon boards. Puerto Rico had an 82 percent success in their attempts from the freethrow line to Turkey’s 57 and outranked Turkey on long range 41-35 but it lost13 balls, six more than Turkey. Turkey was also ahead in second chance points10-1.
Turkey struggled against an aggressive Puerto Rico throughout the firstthree quarters. Turkoglu leveled the score 19-19 with a three pointer in thefinal second of the first quarter. Puerto Rico led with seven points at 7:15 ofthe second quarter and finished it ahead 37-30.
Turkey bounced in the middle of the third quarter but missed threeback-to-back shooting opportunities. Semih Erden(notes) lowered the difference to onepoint from free throws with only two seconds remaining in the third quarter thatended 57-56 in favor of Puerto Rico.
“We were hesitant to start with but we bounced back later and foughtharder,” said Erden. “We began playing better both in offensive and defensiveand that carried us to the victory.”
Kerem Tunceri said the Turkish players felt tired after Tuesday’s night76-65 win over Greece.
“We started playing well later, we began controlling the ball better,”Tunceri said.
Kerem Gonlum put Turkey ahead with a basket at the beginning of the fourthquarter and added one more point from a free throw. And Ilyasova scored athree-pointer seconds later to increase the difference to five points, puttingTurkey ahead after a long lull as nearly 10,000 Turkish fans burst into cheers.Turkey never looked back.
Jose Barea squandered a counter-attack for Puerto Rico with an offensivefoul as Ender Arslan answered with a two-point basket and Turkey’s Kerem Gonlumhad a following slam-dunk. Semih Erden’s tip-in at 7:15 further widened the gapto nine points.
Hidayet Turkoglu hit a three-pointer at 5:01 for Turkey which wasimmediately responded in the same way by Nathan Peavy. But Turkey’s Tunceriscored a free throw to set the score 79-77 with just six seconds to go.
“It was a hard fought game,” said Peavy. “But we put in a good efforttoo.”
Associated Press Writer Suzan Fraser in Ankara contributed to this report.
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