Nagpur: Only 19, Harsh Dagar fired a team-high 28 points — 18 of them from beyond the arc — as India surprised hosts and higher-ranked Bahrain 81-77, to clinch the final qualifying tournament at the Manama on Sunday. India confirmed their Asia Cup berth with this upset.
The four-point triumph over the 66th-ranked Bahrain gave world No 81, India its 11th straight entry to the Asia Cup scheduled in Jeddah from Aug 5-17. For the second time in as many days, Indian cagers came up with a perfect display of three-point shooting. Unlike what happened with Iraq earlier, India improved their rebounding against Bahrain and dominated the battle of boards 48-26 — 16 of which were pulled by Palpreet Singh Brar.
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With an excellent 6-of-8 three-point conversion, Dagar helped India set the tone early as Kanwar Sandhu joined the party with 15 points. Skipper Muin Bek Hafeez and Pranav Prince played pivotal roles when they netted identical 11 points and pulled eight rebounds each and came up with a combined total of eight assists.
Speaking with TOI, India’s American head coach Scott Flemming, who will now be known for beating home teams in away games, said, “Road wins on a team’s home court are always satisfying. I am very proud of this group. Tonight was a quality win against a team that is ranked 15 spots higher than we are in World FIBA rankings. They made a run at us but we had an answer several times.
India basketball team. (FIBA)
“We had a lot to play for and sealed our qualification for August’s Asia Cup. When I first came back, my goal was for us to win one game, which was not done for some time. Since then, we have had three quality wins and have now set our goals much higher.”
In his previous assignment as national coach, Flemming helped India stun China in China, and now he led a young team to get the better of Bahrain.
Young guard Dagar said, “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 will try to continue that performance in future too.”
RESULT
India (Harsh Dagar 28, Kanwar Sandhu 15, Muin Bek Hafeez 11, Pranav Prince 11) bt Bahrain (Mustafa Rashed 30, Mohammed Hamoda 11) 81-77 (25-20, 14-16, 23-17, 19-24)
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