Boomers Overpower Japan in Second Half

The Australian Boomers have overpowered Japan 80-64 with Emmett Naar dishing out 11 assists and his Illawarra Hawks NBL teammate Alex Mudronja among those to take advantage along with championship winners Nick Kay and Angus Brandt.

The Boomers opened this stage of the FIBA World Cup Asian Qualifiers in Okinawa, Japan with a dominant 98-61 win against Chinese Taipei on Friday, but taking on the host nation on Sunday was always going to be a significantly bigger test.

That certainly proved the case in the first with Australia only leading by two points at half-time, but they put their foot down with the first nine points of the second half. From there, they cruised to the eventual 80-64 victory.

There was plenty to like about the Boomers performance under the coaching of Rob Beveridge with captain Nick Kay top-scoring with 15 points, 11 rebounds and seven assists.

His former Perth Wildcats teammate Angus Brandt was a strong force inside too with 14 points and four rebounds while current 'Cats development player Kyle Zunic had 11 points and three assists.

Illawarra Hawks pair Emmett Naar (four points, 11 assists) and Alex Mudronja (11 points, three boards) came up big as well while Craig Moller did a power of work with seven points, 10 rebounds and three assists.

Sydney Kings young star Jaylin Galloway put up seven points as well while Sean MacDonald added four points, Akoldah Gak four points and two rebounds, and Rhys Vague three points and two boards.

Yuki Togashi top-scored for Japan with 19 points on 5/9 shooting from three to go with five assists.

It was basket for basket for the first half of the opening quarter but Australia pulled away late in the term with a run of scoring 13 consecutive points. That included a triple to Nick Kay and back-to-back buckets for Akoldah Gak.

That saw the Boomers lead 22-14 by quarter-time but Japan was able to close the gap in the second quarter despite a couple of early baskets from Angus Brant. 

The host nation went on an impressive run to take the lead briefly at 36-33 but Australia was able to finish the half well including a three from Alex Mudronja and buckets from Jaylin Galloway and Craig Moller.

Australia went into the half-time break leading narrowly 42-40 and then the Boomers blew the game wide open to start the third quarter. Kay opened up the half with a three-pointer, Brandt scored a couple of jumpers and Emmett Naar got to the rack as well for a run of nine straight points.

Japan's only nine points of the third quarter came courtesy of three-pointers from Yuki Togashi, but the Boomers scored 22 points including eight in-a-row from Mudronja to hold a commanding 64-49 lead by three quarter-time.

Kyle Zunic nailed a three-pointer to open the fourth quarter and when he hit another late in the term Australia's lead was out to 21, before settling at 16.

The Boomers will now close this trip to Japan for the World Cup qualifiers with another meeting with Chinese Taipei in Okinawa on Monday at 5.30pm AEDT.

FIBA WORLD CUP ASIAN QUALIFIERS

AUSTRALIAN BOOMERS 80 (Kay 15, Brandt 14, Mudronja 11, Zunic 11)

JAPAN 64 (Togashi 19, Evans 11, Murphy 7)

BOX SCORE