France proved too strong for the Philippines, winning 93-84 despite NBA star Nicolas Batum not playing in an Olympic Qualifier in Manila.
France beat the Philippines in their opening round of the Olympic Qualifier. In a team with three NBA stars playing they only managed to beat the host nation by nine points.
For France, Nicolas Batum did not play. In his absence, Joffrey Lauvergne played a good game; in 15 minutes he scored 10 points on 5-of-9 shooting. He also had two rebounds and two assists.
Also for France, Boris Diaw, who will be traded from the San Antonio Spurs to the Utah Jazz omnce the NBA moratorium is over, flirted with a triple double with nine points, nine rebounds and six assists (matching a game-high).
He managed to accomplish this in 36 minutes in the 40-minute contest.
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The undoubted star for the French is San Antonio starting point guard Tony Parker, who in 30 minutes scored 21 points on 7-of-13 shooting. Parker had a good all-around game, collecting four rebounds and an equal game high six assists.
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Former NBA player
Nando De Colo, who played two years in the NBA, played 33 minutes and had a game-high 27 points on 9-of-14 shooting. He also hit 7-of-7 from the line. In another complete French performance, he collected six rebounds, two assists and three steals.
The Philippines have never been able to get a home grown player into the NBA, if a team was to draft a Philippino player they would have a mad basketball nation automatically supporting them.
They have a naturalized former NBA player in this tournament however. Andray Blatche played in the NBA for nine seasons, seven of these for the Washington Wizards and then two for the Brooklyn Nets, with career averages of 10.1 points and 5.4 rebounds in 22.1 minutes.
Playing the Chinese Basketball Association at the moment, Blatche was clearly the best player for the Philippines. He played 32 minutes and scored 21 points on 7-of-14 shooting. Blatche collected eight rebounds, including four offensive.
Blatche also had three steals and one blocked shot.
Terrence Romeo scored 19 points and Troy Rosario collected nine rebounds, including seven offensive, in other standout performances for the Philippino team.
In most games, the better shooting team wins the night. France shot 66 percent from the field compared to 43 percent by the Philippines.
The Philippines out-rebounded France on the offensive end 19-14 but could not convert those chances, with France getting more second-chance points, 21-16.
France had better ball movement with 18 assists to 11 for the Philippines, and they also took better care of the ball with 15 turnovers, while the Philippines had 18.
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France was able to take advantage of their size and presence inside the paint, scoring 54-34 points in the paint, this included a 21-16 advantage in second chance points.
The bench unit of the Philippines performed better than the French 33-24, keeping the Philippines in the game.
To put it bluntly, France is a better basketball team than the Philippines and that was without their amazing 3-and-D player, Batum.
The next game for the Philippines is against New Zealand on day two. France finishes the tournament on the last day of the group stages against New Zealand.