The gateway to Q School, which is like “needle hole,” is the heart of top-rated players such as Lee Choong-bok and Oh Sung-wook.
As the first division players’ contrast on the first day of the professional basketball PBA Q School finals is mixed, the players are realizing the “competition of hell.”
Kim Im-kwon (Welcome Savings Bank), who was ranked below 60th last season as a first-division player, maintained his qualification as a first-division player with three wins on the first day of the 2024 PBA Cue School finals (second round) held at KINTEX PBA Stadium in Goyang, Gyeonggi Province on the 21st.
Only 10 of the 79 players won the first division ticket on the day. The remaining 69 players have to seek two chances, one on Tuesday (nine players selected) and the other on Sunday (eight players selected), but the situation is quite daunting. As the final 27 out of 79 players are to be chosen, they have to overcome the competition ratio of 3 to 1, but they have so many masters that if they make a mistake, they will be eliminated.
Kim Im-kwon beat Shin Dong-min, Park Ki-myung and Kim Ki-hyuk one after another to win the first part ticket as the second place overall (1.791 average), but PBA’s leading players, such as Lee Choong-bok (High1 Resort) and Oh Sung-wook (NH Nonghyup Card), failed to advance on the first day of the finals.
Lee Choong-bok, who started Q School ranking 119th due to poor performance in the first part of the tour last season, won 40-23 (24 innings) against Park Jung-geun in the first match of the finals. However, he failed to pass the first round early in the second match, as he was caught 29-40 (28 innings) by Lee Hae-dong, a former member of the Dream Tour. The top-flight players, including Oh Sung-wook, Kim Tae-kwan (Crown Haitai), Kim Ki-hyuk, and Kang Sang-gu, also failed to decide whether they would survive in the first division on the first day.
Of the 10 players who confirmed their advance to the first division on the first day of the finals, five players including Kim Im-kwon, Lee Kyung-wook, Jeon In-hyuk, Choi Myung-jin and Lee Jong-hoon were in the first division last season. Five players from the second and third divisions of the Dream and Challenge Tour also seem to be fighting equally as they secured the berth to the first division. In particular, the first place on the first day was Lee Ho-young, a former member of the Dream Tour who scored 14 high-run points.
The 31 players from the second and third divisions who made it to the Q School finals have achieved a certain level of performance or higher. They beat the competition ratio of 2-1 in a preliminary match of 64 players and are tied up with 48 players who were eliminated in the first division and are fighting in the finals. All of them are proven players on the professional stage and can be considered to have “Hankyu” skills.
“The fact that only Kim Im-gwon among the team league players secured tickets for the first division on the first day of the Q School finals shows that the competition is fierce. Many of the players in the second division graduated from the first division. It is getting harder to pass the Q School,” Kim Hyun-seok said.
BY: 토토사이트링크