American point guard Jonathan Gibson spearheaded the low-seeded Qingdao Eagles to a tough 114-109 victory over erstwhile league leaders Sichuan Blue Whales in round 31 of the 2015-2016 Chinese Basketball Association season on Wednesday at the Guoxin Gymnasium in Qingdao, Shandong, China.
Gibson, who played at New Mexico State during college, scored an impressive game-high 48 points that came with eight rebounds and four assists to help the Eagles get their third straight win, as per Asia-basket.
The undrafted NBA aspirant shot 12-of-25 from the field, including 6-of-15 from three-point distance, while also sinking 18-of-21 foul shots en route to his high-scoring performance.
American Alan Williams, who plays center for Qingdao, added 23 points and 16 rebounds coming off the bench for head coach Gong Xiaobin while guard-forward Zhang Chengyu contributed 18 points, five rebounds, and six assists starting alongside Gibson.
Sichuan was led by American small forward Mike Harris with 44 points, 16 rebounds, and four assists as head coach Yang Xuezeng's boys tried to compensate for the absence of Iranian giant Hamed Haddadi who took the game off.
Harris' fellow American import Justin Dentmon contributed 14 points and five assists in 31 minutes as a substitute while starting center Jia Cheng had 16 points and nine rebounds while nursing foul trouble the whole game for the Blue Whales.
The Eagles controlled much of the first half and led by seven at the halftime break, 55-48, behind the plays of Gibson and Williams.
A huge 41-point third quarter for Qingdao gave them one of their largest leads of the match at 16 points, 96-80, right at the end of the penultimate period. The biggest lead they built was at 19 points, 94-75, time down to one minute remaining in the third.
The Blue Whales tried to stage a comeback rally in the fourth quarter and was actually able to outscore the hosts by eleven points, 29-18, in the final canto, via Sofa Score, but it was a little bit too late for Harris and company to overtake the Eagles at that point in time.
With the win, Qingdao moved up to the 13th spot of the current CBA table while Sichuan surrendered the top spot to the Xinjiang Flying Tigers and settled for second place at the moment.