South Sudan Basketball Head Coach Royal Ivey.

South Sudan Basketball Team head coach, Royal Ivey said the Bright Stars must stay focused and improve after the “crazy” World Cup opening match in which they lost 96:101 to Puerto Rico.

South Sudan was leading throughout the first three quarters but lost control of the game in the last quarter as Puerto Rico took the lead at 81:78 in the final 16 seconds.

The Orange Monsters emerged winners in the Group B game at the Manila Araneta Coliseum in Manila, the Philippines, earlier on Saturday.

Speaking to the media, Head Coach Royal Ivey said he feels sorry for the loss and that the team will learn from that experience.

Mr. Ivey said his players should pick up the pieces and keep their dreams alive.

“It was a very emotional game. My guys competed, they played hard. This is a learning experience. Our fans were great, I pumped our fans up and we were forced into OT,” Ivey told the media.

“That was a crazy episode, like I said the game was up and down. We’re a young team, there’s no moral victory for us. We can’t be happy; we have to get better.”

“At the end of the day, it’s all about composure. We can’t feel sorry for ourselves, we have to pick up the pieces to keep our dream living”, coach Royal Ivey said in the post-game press conference.

Meanwhile, South Sudan’s basketball legend and coach, William Deng said the Puerto Rico loss was due to the squad’s exhaustion and lack of composure in the fourth quarter of the game.

“What made the difference was that Puerto Rico players have been together for long, and they know themselves very well. Our players lost their physical and mental fitness in the last quarter and that was the reason,” he said.

“In such cases the coach is supposed to depend only on the five or six players who have been together long.”

however, the secretary general of Central Equatoria basketball federation Paul Isaac, landed the defeat to the luck of the funs support.

he says the team has gotten used to playing under the support of its huge fans during the qualification time or even during the preparation time.

“If you look back during our qualification games the team was doing the best when our fans were around them, so this is a big contribution to the loss.”

“According to the initial plan over 600 supporters were supposed to be sent after the team but I don’t know what happened in the last minutes. This needs to be corrected before Monday and Wednesday’s game.”