Turner says Jamaica lacked fight in 123-74 FIBA qualifying rout by Bahamas

Jamaica’s bid to reach the FIBA World Championships took another heavy blow on Friday when the national side fell 74-123 to The Bahamas before a full house at Sir Kendal Isaacs Gymnasium in Nassau. The result marked a third consecutive loss for the Reggae Boyz of basketball and left them third in Group B of the Americas qualifying window.

Canada, Jamaica’s opponent on Monday, remained unbeaten after beating Puerto Rico 110-84 on the same day and continued to sit atop the group ahead of The Bahamas.

The host nation spread scoring across five players in double figures. Valdez Edgecombe topped the game with 26 points. Dominic Bridgewater came off the bench to add 23, while Franco Miller finished with 18, Buddy Hield with 15 and Kai Jones with 12.

For Jamaica, Andrew Thelwell was the top scorer with 24 points and Chase Audige contributed 18.

Head coach Rick Turner offered a blunt assessment once the final buzzer sounded. “We just got punched in the mouth by a really, really good basketball team,” he said. “We allowed them to kind of start ‘feeling themselves’. They’re a great team anyway, and so our lack of physicality, I think, was a factor early on by letting them get going — and then it just kind of spiralled from there and got a little bit out of control.”

Turner said he did not expect his side to show so little resistance against the home team. “We like to think of our team as a group that is never going to back down from a fight, and we just didn’t have the fight tonight. I’m surprised by it, really. I’m not surprised by the quality that Team Bahamas showed — and they’ve got such good players, and they’re so well coached, and they played really well together — you know, that that part of it didn’t surprise me. The part that surprised me was just a little bit of our lack of fight, I suppose,” the Jamaica coach explained.

He said there is now only one path forward if Jamaica is to remain alive in the race for a World Championship berth. “There’s no choice but to rebound, right? Literally and figuratively; I mean, we go from one great team to another great team, you know? We talked about this in the first two windows. We were put in the most difficult pool in the tournament, and you know when you’re talking about Canada, Puerto Rico, and The Bahamas, you got the work cut out for you.

“We got to flush this one, we got to put it in the rear-view mirror — [we] can’t feel sorry for ourselves — and get ready for another great basketball team.”

Jamaica had pushed The Bahamas to a three-point defeat when the sides met in Kingston in February, but on Friday they never found footing. They trailed 18-28 after the opening quarter, were down 32-61 at the break and entered the fourth period facing a 48-90 deficit.