Although they failed to regain the top spot for the first time in two years, they played a truly brilliant game. Gangwon Special Self-Governing Province (Chuncheon Tigers) star Cho Seung-hyeon (42) played a big role in the wheelchair basketball finals.
Gangwon lost 77-78 to Seoul Metropolitan City (Coway Blue Wheels) in the men’s wheelchair basketball OPEN final of the 45th National Sports Festival for the Disabled held at Sajik Indoor Gymnasium in Busan on the 31st.
Gangwon, which won the championship at the 42nd Paralympic Games in 2023, returned to the finals after two years and aimed for the gold medal. However, in this year’s regular season of the Wheelchair Basketball League, they had to swallow their disappointment as they failed to seek revenge against the Seoul team, which was behind by one game.
On this day, Gangwon, which had once won the game by 19 points, began to gradually catch up in the second half of the third quarter. The attack eventually allowed a reversal as there was no escape route. In addition, with a 2-point lead, only one of the two free throws made right before the end was successful, so he had to swallow the downpour.
Still, Cho Seung-hyun’s performance shone. He scored a whopping 19 points, including 5 3-pointers, from the first quarter and played a role in assembling Gangwon’s offense throughout the game. He was the problem solver himself and did not neglect creating chances with sensible passes. The 39 points he scored that day were the highest score for both teams.
Cho Seung-hyun, a gold medalist at the 2014 Incheon Asian Para Games, is a wheelchair basketball star who consistently plays with the Taegeuk symbol. Although the team only finished in second place, they proved their worth in the finals.
However, Cho Seung-hyun thought more about the team than himself. He met with Star News after the finals and confessed, “Basketball is a team sport. Even if an individual performs well, it doesn’t mean much if the team loses. I should have focused more until the end and played, but I am very disappointed that I missed the game that we won.”
Gangwon and Seoul are strong teams in wheelchair basketball and are competing fiercely. Seung-Hyeon Cho said, “The two teams are originally teams that play a see-saw game. We were ahead by a lot in the beginning, but I thought the other team would bring their own performance before the end of the fourth quarter.” He then expressed regret, saying, “It was our loss that we couldn’t overcome that.”
The Chuncheon Tigers are led by coach Dong-gi Cho, who was previously the head coach of Bucheon Hana Foreign Exchange (currently Hana Bank). Leo Fujimoto, a Japanese foreign player, plays in the wheelchair basketball league, but cannot appear in the Paralympic Games.
Seung-Hyeon Cho said, “I am satisfied that we played on equal footing with the team ranked first in the league without any foreign players, and I think we will see better results in the future.” He continued, “I wanted to show that Chuncheon is strong even without Fujimoto, and I think we haven’t shown it enough at this level.”
Lastly, Cho Seung-hyun promised to do well in the next competition, saying, “If I continue like I am now, I think I will go home with a gold medal around my neck next year.”
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