BEIJING - Liaoning Hunters defeated defending champion Bayi Fubang 95-84 in Tuesday's Game 4 of the first round playoffs of the Chinese Basketball Association league (CBA).
Bayi Fubang's Mo Ke (in red) blocks Liaoning Hunters' Li Xiaoxu during their fourth game of the first round CBA play-offs. Liaoning won the fourth game 95-84 and dispatched the defending champion 3-1 in the best-of-five series. [Xinhua] Liaoning won the series by 3-1 and entered the semifinals of the playoffs.
This was the first time in CBA's 12-year history that Bayi failed to pass the first round, and the sixth-placings in the regular season was also the worst results in franchise history.
The military team won eight championships, three runners-up and once third placings in the league history.
In the other first-round match, Fujian SBS beat Jiangsu Dragons 108-107 to tie the series 2-2 and Game 5 will be played again on Jiangsu's home court on Wednesday.
Olumide Oyedeji, which Liaoning acquired from Beijing Ducks after regular season, had 25 points and 15 rebounds to lead Liaoning to come back from a 19-4 trailing for the victory.
Guard Bian Qiang shot 6-out-of-8 on 3-pointer to chip in 24 points and five rebounds for Liaoning.
Wang Zhizhi had 24 points and 10 rebounds for Bayi, which failed to win the trophy for the first time with the pivot Wang in the squad.
The away team started the game well and led 30-21 in the first quarter, but was beaten in the second by 28-16 and lost control of the game in the second half.
Point guard Liu Xiaoming buried two free-throws with 0.6 seconds to go to give Fujian hope for advancing.
Gong Songlin had the game-high 32 points to hold back Jiangsu's surge-up in the fourth quarter.