Korean coach Cho Sang-Hyun calls SJ Belangel winner 'lucky shot'

With this "lucky shot" from SJ Belangel, South Korea suffered a heartbreak. FIBA/Paul Ryan Tan

By Ivan Saldajeno

MANILA--South Korea was just 2.9 seconds away from forcing overtime against Gilas Pilipinas in their FIBA Asia Cup Qualifiers match-up at the Angeles University Foundation Sports and Cultural Center after Lee Hyun-Jung scored on a stop-and-pop three that tied the game at 78-all.

Another Lee, Lee Seoung-Hyun, put up a tough defense on SJ Belangel, forcing the latter to go for an even tougher fallaway just before the final buzzer sounded.

As fate would have it, Belangel's shot went in off the glass, and Gilas escaped with an 81-78 win.

[Related Story: SJ Belangel's trey lifts Gilas over SoKor in ACQ]

"It was a lucky shot," Coach Cho Sang-Hyun simply described the play as translated by a Korean interpreter.

Supposedly, according to Cho: "We planned out a switch in the last two seconds so that there's no space for a second shot."

Cho even thought of a trap as an alternate.

The initial defensive scheme seemed to have worked as the 5-foot-10 Belangel found himself with the six-foot-six Lee Seoung-Hyun beside him.

At the end of the day, however, Belangel made the shot that mattered in the end.

"There's nothing we had to do to fix it," Cho further said. "There was no way of defending it."

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