By Ken Marantz, OCA Media
Nagoya, Japan, September 22, 2026: Japan remained full throttle on a collision course with powerhouse China, taking advantage of a poor start by the Philippines to cruise to an 89-67 victory on Tuesday in their final group stage game in women’s basketball.
Miyu Okamoto hit five 3-pointers and scored a game-high 19 points as Japan finished Group C with a 3-0 record to all but assure it and China will be placed in separate brackets in the quarterfinals.
“As I’ve said before when I spoke here, the No. 1 priority of this team is to come away with a win,” Japan coach Yuko Oga said. “That we were able to secure a solid win is something that every one of us should be happy about. But you learn something in every game, and the things we need to reflect on, we want to apply for the next one.”
Japan captain Ami Tsuneta, who scored sparingly in the first two games, also got hot and hit 4 of 6 3-pointers to finish with 18 points. Overall, Japan sank 15 of 37 shots from beyond the arc.
China, which finished up play Monday, topped three-team Group A with a 2-0 record. In Group C, Korea came out on top at 3-0 after winning 73-59 over Chinese Taipei in a showdown between unbeaten teams.
In the day’s second game at Aichi International Arena, Japan took advantage of the Philippines’ slow start to power to a 24-11 lead in the first quarter.
“The game plan was pretty good, but in the first quarter, it didn’t look like we had any plan,” said Philippines coach BT Toews, who has extensive experience coaching in Japan’s pro men’s and women’s leagues.
“I feel that the players couldn’t execute the details in the first quarter because of the intense pressure from Japan, which we knew was coming. When we had a bad start, it started to steamroll, it got worse and worse.”
The Philippines finally found their rhythm, aggressively ball-hawking and creating scoring chances. After going into halftime trailing 52-32, they cut the lead to 15 in the third quarter when Elizabeth Means sank a jumper off an offensive rebound.
“I think our defense really lacked, especially in the first quarter,” Means said. “We weren’t getting out on shots, we weren’t aware of where they were on the court, and a team like Japan, anyone can knock it down. It’s hard to stay with them when they’re making that many 3s.”
But any hopes of a miracle comeback were cut short when Okamoto opened the fourth quarter with a pair of 3-pointers, then hit another later on to give Japan an 80-57 lead.
“Philippines players do not give up easily, as we saw,” Toews said. “I don’t think it was always pretty, especially on offense…But the defense got better when we made a few adjustments, we started switching more. But even to the very end, the switching was good on the perimeter, but we had trouble guarding in the paint area. Lack of size was certainly a problem.”
Both teams are playing without their best players. The top Japanese appeared for the national team at the recent Women’s World Cup, while the best of the Philippines are currently with their pro teams or at U.S. colleges.
China, meanwhile, has 10 of the 12 players from the squad that reached the quarterfinals of the World Cup, including 2.23-meter teenager Zhang Ziyu.
