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Our boys kicked off the season with a win in Buterter Arena over Japan U21. This season marks the first time the Asian Qualifiers is held in Singapore since season 34, where legendary U21 manager Big Ben brought home the organizing rights 3 times in a row. This season marked the 6th time it is held in our country.

With the same story as last season, our U21 was hit by a GS bug (with the same culprit as last season). We had to once again play our opening game without talismanic big man Chua How Feng, who was feeling fatigued from overplaying last week. He has currently been dropped from the squad until further notice.

Thankfully, team captain Ang An Da stepped up to lead our boys to victory. He completed the game with a double-double, posting 15 points and 10 assists. Kok Loong An also proved that experience in at U21 level is useful, picking up the first double-double of the team with 14 points and 13 rebounds. He was also scrappy on defense, with 1 block and 2 steals. However, he racked up 5 fouls early in the game, and lost the ball 5 times, so the night wasn't all smooth for him.

Png Rong had his fair share of ups and downs as well. He had a hard time finding the net, being clamped down by Japan's star forward Seitaro Inokuma. However he made it up in the other end of the floor with an astouding 5 blocks and 2 steals. He also picked up 8 rebounds and dished out 3 assists.

We also had several standout players. Khalil Kanchan got our boys going in the 1st after Japan led the game 4-0. He ended the game with a game high 23 points on 42% shooting (43% from 3), and was active on the offensive boards, grabbing 5 offensive rebounds. His all round statline (including 7 rebounds and 5 assists) made it a debut to remember. Playing behind him was Fong Kum Hui, who did not want to be outdone as well. Shooting 60% both from field and outside, he scored 17 points in 14 minutes and ended the game with an impactful +13 in +/-.

Finally, Chang Jun Ying was the star which broke us free from the clutch of our Japanese counterparts at the end of the third. We let them claw back in the 2nd, before a Zhao Choon Keong buzzerbeater kept us in the lead by 1 going into halftime, and the game was close from there on until the 3rd. Down by 1 with 37 seconds left, Chang Jun Ying entered the court and drilled a 3 from the right corner off a magnificent pass by Khalil Kanchan. He stripped Chikara Teshigahara of the ball at the final second, dashed down the court and hit and amazing buzzerbeater while receiving contact from Kei Yoshihara, before converting the FT for an And 1. Just like that, we earned a quick 6 points to go up by 5 entering the final quarter.

We will be facing a much superior opponent in the form of Indonesia U21 in our next match. Hopefully Chua How Feng has recovered from his fatigue to give us a fighting chance.

finally my boy showing some sign.. hope he will improve in this season

He is our CP3 this season xD too bad we don't have Durant and Booker to go with him.

I certainly didn't expect a win, as Indonesia U21 had quite a solid squad. But regardless, an awesome showdown was in store for us as it was supposed to be a battle between two of the best floor generals in SEA: Ang An Da and Christiawan Christanda.

However, as luck would have it, the Indonesian guard picked up an injury last week, ruling him out for the next 3 weeks. Coupled with the return to form of talismanic bigman Chua How Feng, our boys powered to a hard fought 95-87 win. Although the win looked comfortable enough, it actually took a second half rally to seal the game, after the visitors shocked us in the second quarter.

We actually had an upper hand, thanks to the Indonesians expecting us to hit them on the outside. Thankfully our team was versatile enough to pull off an inside oriented attack, throwing them off guard. Still, they held out well in the first, trailing only by 1 point, before running us ragged in the second.

Ang An Da showed his quality as one of the best players on the floor by with a double-double, thanks to his statline of 13 points and 10 assists. He also picked up 4 rebounds and 2 steals. Chua How Feng also picked up a double-double to celebrate his return to the team, with 15 points and 10 rebounds. He also dished out 3 assist and rejected 2 shots. Kok Loong An however, failed to join his long time U21 teammates on the double-double list, as he was 1 rebound short. He ended the game with 15 points, 9 rebounds, and a game high 3 steals, which was pretty impressive as well.

Outside of the more experienced players, Chang Jung Ying once again showed his scoring prowess by hitting a game high 23 points on 11 of 20 shooting, while Png Rong led the team in blocks, swatting away 3 shots in his limited 11 minutes. He now has 4 blocks per game for the U21.

Our boy's fairytale run is set to come to an end next week as we take on Taiwan U21. Let's hope we give them a good fight!

Ang an da finally become a point guard I vision. I just need him to up his offensive abit then move back to defensive training

Our boys were totally overpowered by Taiwan U21 today, coming up with our first loss. We put up a good fight in the first, but it was downhill all the way as Taiwan had much higher qualify across the team, despite the absence of their starting C, Zeng Wai Kiu.

Chua How Feng was the bright spot for our team, ending the game with a double double. His all round gameplay saw him pick up a statlinr of 12 points, 10 rebounds, 3 assists, a steal and a block. With his second consecutive U21 game with 10 rebounds, he is at 209 career U21 rebounds, just 48 behind making it into 10th place in the all time standings. Should he keep it up at this pace, he's expected to break into the list at the second round of the Asia U21 Championship Tournament.

Ang An Da put up some big numbers by scoring a game high 23 points. However, it is more than meets the eye, as he did that on a highly inefficient 30/10/60 splits. That said, it was still some important points gained as it kept us in the game.

We have agree Monday next week, so stay tuned on Wednesday to see who will be face in a scrimmage.

A pretty chill Monday for us today as we spent our "week off" going for massages and having cheap seafood in Malaysia, in conjunction with the friendly against our neighbors on their home ground. However, all that shopping and partying seems to have taken a toll on most of our boys as we crashed to a 79-93 loss.

Talismanic bigman Chua How Feng's decision to stay out of the fun paid off, as he was by far the best player on court, picking up a double-double on 59% shooting. He ended the game with a game high 24 points, 11 rebounds, 3 assists and 2 blocks. Kok Loong An wasn't too shabby himself, trying hard to match his post partner's pace with a 19 point 11 rebound effort. Sadly, the effects of his enjoyment seems to have slightly affected him, as he sloppily picked up 5 fouls and lost the ball twice.

After a relaxing week, our boys will return to the grind next week against Lebanon U21, who have a squad with the closest quality to ours. It's not a crucial matchup tho, judging by the squad quality of our pool, should there be no hiccups, Lebanon U21 and us will occupy 2nd and 3rd. Since the 2nd and 3rd place gets put in the same pool for the next round, thst match will only give us bragging rights. Still, I hope we pick up a good result. Stay tuned!

Our boys fell for the third time in 3 games as Lebanon U21 came from behind to serve our boys a 81-90 loss on a cold platter. As they are our only realistic hurdle left for qualification this phase, I decided to go experimental, testing out a defensive formation I couldn't get myself to trust all this while since I expected them to go inside. Coincidentally they played 3-2 against us, and the results seem to support my suspicion.

Our starters really played well in the game. Chua How Feng and Ang An Da led by example in the absence of our third vet Kok Loong An. Chua had one of the best games in his career, picking up a double-double thanks to 18 points and 24 points from 71% shooting while Ang added 15 points and 7 assists. Zhao Choon Keong also tried to match Chua's output, putting up a magnificent two-way performance with 10 points, 15 rebounds and 3 blocks to end the game with a double-double. The duo combined for 15 offensive rebounds to keep our team going. Meanwhile, Ethan Bin Intuang gave us a glimpse of his true colours in his first start for the U21. Thrown into the starting lineup due to game shape issues, he did not disappoint, contributing solidly in both offense and defense has he finished with a statline of 15 points, 6 rebounds, and 3 steals.

Our loss today was mainly caused by the lack of depth. Thanks to 3 players with game shape issues, we were forced to throw Abdur-Razzaq Jalil into the lineup. Let's hope things will go smoothly in the next two weeks.

That said, speaking of 3-2 and 2-3, watching this game allowed me to infer (I haven't ran it through the game analyzer, so it might be inaccurate) 3-2 is still the superior defense against LI, despite the buff. Here are some pointers I took away from the game:
1. Although LI is an inside offense, it primarily uses guards to get things going. Meaning quite often instead of passing the ball into the bigs, the guards will go for driving layups (this was actually proven a long time ago, from the era when LI was the best offense, which is why most top guards have high IS). 3-2 with 3 high OD not only cuts this drive, but it also prevents passes into your bigs. This can be seen from our 16 three point attempts despite playing an inside offense, with most of them being at the end of the shot clock. Your perimeter players can't get the ball past the defense, hence are forced to shoot from outside. Our opponents only had 7 shots from 3 because 2-3 leaves your perimeter open, hence allowing them to drive inside. It also causes more open shots from 3.
2. The rebounding advantage of 2-3 can neutralize the rebounding advantage gained by LI, while your opponent might have the advantage on the boards if you play 3-2. This is evident in the difference in offensive rebounds of both teams (24 vs 3). Although skill level might come into play, but it's interesting to see how we dominated the boards entirely. That said, rebounding is one of the less valuable skills in BB, so the cons might still outweigh the pros.

I almost regretted taking the Lebanon U21 game lightly when Husnan Pukhraj won the jumpball and our opponents raced to an early lead. Thankfully that did not last long, as a sharpshooting effort from Nathan Macklin gave us a slim lead in the first. He was hot from the field as he went 6 of 6 until midway through the second, and that was sufficient for us to build an unassailable lead.

The buildup to this game was bad. 5 of our 13 players had bad game shape, leaving us with only 7 serious players. Thankfully, we're blessed with a deep U21 pool. I didn't have many choices early in the season as a lot of trainers tend to push 1 on 1 much longer these days, especially for high potential players. However, we're blessed that they have managed to plug in the holes by midseason, giving me more firepower. It actually happened last week, with Phua De Keong making his debut against Lebanon U21. Sadly calling up Cheng Da Ping on Saturday morning seemed to jinx him, as he was so excited that he played too hard and broke his nose later on in the day. Thankfully, we had 2 other backups at hand, Mike Gomboting and Nathan Mackin, both who performed admirably last night, with the latter earning a double-double with a statline of 16 points, 12 rebounds and 6 assists. Zhao Choon Keong also joined him in the double-double club as he posted 15 points, 18 rebounds and an astounding 6 blocks.

Both of our star veterans also did not disappoint. Ang An Da led the team in scoring with 17 points after hitting 8 of his 12 shots from the field. He was just one assist short of a double-double. Meanwhile Chua How Feng also barely missed out on a double-double, thanks to a terrible shooting day. He missed 7 of his 11 field goal attempts, ending the game with only 8 points. However, he made it up on the other side of the court, with 2 blocks, 3 steals and 9 defensive rebounds (11 total rebounds). He now sits at 238 career rebounds for the U21 and is just 19 short of breaking into the all-time rebounding list.

We have now virtually secured qualification into the next round, as our next match is against Thailand U21, who could potentially tie us in game record should they beat us. However they would need to beat us by 57 points in order to make it through to the next round, as the point difference is too big.

We're through folks!

The Thais went all out for the kill, but in the end their quality could not match ours. Nathan Macklin built on his impressive debut with another great game today, hitting 7 of his 15 shots from the field to lead the team with 15 points. That was a pretty decent hit rate considering tonight's game was very defensive, as our boys only managed to hit slightly over a third of our shots. However, the best player on the field was evidently Chua How Feng. Starting slow, he managed to score more efficiently later on, thus putting up and impressive 15 point 22 rebound double-double. He managed to tie Marios Tsachilis for the 10th most rebounds made for the U21 in a game, but the effort propelled him up to the 9th place in the all-time rebound standings. With 6 more games to go, he can likely end up at 2nd place.

Our next pool should consist of: Philippines U21, Malaysia U21, Hong Kong U21, Iran U21, and Lebanon U21. Our best bet is to battle it out for fourth place against Malaysia U21 and Lebanon U21.

Congratulations for next round!
NT closed lost yesterday, no more chance for next round :( .