{"id":89476,"date":"2025-08-23T07:38:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-23T07:38:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/89476\/"},"modified":"2025-08-23T07:38:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-23T07:38:09","slug":"dominican-republic-opens-the-fiba-americup-2025-with-a-victory-fiba-basketball","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/89476\/","title":{"rendered":"Dominican Republic opens the FIBA AmeriCup 2025 with a victory\u00a0|\u00a0FIBA Basketball"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>MANAGUA (Nicaragua) \u2013 The Dominican Republic secured an <a class=\"_1pmct9j0\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.fiba.basketball\/en\/events\/fiba-americup-2025\/games\/121411-DOM-COL#boxscore\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">84-59<\/a> victory over Colombia on the opening day of the FIBA AmeriCup 2025. The Caribbean squad, led by star player David Jones-Garc\u00eda, earned its first win, placing the team at the top of Group C (along with Argentina) in the tournament held at the Alexis Arguello Sports Complex in Managua, Nicaragua.<\/p>\n<p>Turning point<\/p>\n<p>The Dominican Republic effectively closed out the final minutes of the second and third quarters.<\/p>\n<p>A 10-0 run before halftime gave them an 11-point lead (44-33) heading into the second half. Then, N\u00e9stor &#8220;Che&#8221; Garc\u00eda\u2019s team did the same in the third quarter, finishing with a 9-2 run to take an 18-point lead (66-48) into the final stretch, securing the victory.<\/p>\n<p>TCL player of the game<\/p>\n<p>David Jones-Garc\u00eda showed his NBA credentials and stepped up for a Dominican team where four players scored in double digits.<\/p>\n<p>The San Antonio Spurs forward finished with 22 points, 8 rebounds, 4 assists, 2 blocks, and 1 steal for an efficiency rating of 24.<\/p>\n<p>Other notable players were Jassel P\u00e9rez (16 points and 6 rebounds), Joel Soriano (13 points and 5 rebounds), and Andr\u00e9s Feliz (10 points, 9 assists, and 5 rebounds).<\/p>\n<p>For Colombia, the best players were Braian Angola with 19 points, 9 rebounds, and 3 assists, as well as Romario Roque with 15 points, 5 steals, 3 assists, and 3 boards.<\/p>\n<p>Stats don\u2019t lie<\/p>\n<p>The Dominican team was more efficient, shooting 52 percent from the field, while the Colombians only made 30 percent of their shots, with just 5 three-pointers in 37 attempts (14 percent).<\/p>\n<p>The Dominicans also controlled transitions, scoring 35 points on fast breaks.<\/p>\n<p>Bottom line<\/p>\n<p>The nine assists by Andr\u00e9s Feliz tied the record for a Dominican player in the AmeriCup since 2003. The Real Madrid player tied Luis Flores, who had nine assists on two separate occasions.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, Romario Roque set a record for Colombia with 5 steals in a single game.<\/p>\n<p>They said<\/p>\n<p>N\u00e9stor Garc\u00eda highlighted his team&#8217;s defensive adjustments after a close first quarter.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;At the start, they rotated the ball very well, and we had to adjust on defense. After that, we went on a run that allowed us to build a lead that we managed until the end of the game,&#8221; the Argentine coach stated in a press conference.<\/p>\n<p>Jones-Garc\u00eda downplayed his recognition as Player of the Game, emphasizing the victory above all else.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Honestly, being the player of the game isn&#8217;t important to me. From the beginning, I told the coach and my teammates that the important thing is to win. In the end, it doesn&#8217;t matter who plays well; what matters is bringing joy to our country,&#8221; he concluded.<\/p>\n<p>FIBA<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MANAGUA (Nicaragua) \u2013 The Dominican Republic secured an 84-59 victory over Colombia on the opening day of the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":89477,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":["post-89476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=89476"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89476\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/89477"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=89476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=89476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=89476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}