China finish fourth after losing Asian Games basketball bronze-medal game

China's men's basketball team finished fourth at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games after losing 79-70 to Iran in the bronze-medal game on Sunday, ending its campaign with consecutive defeats in the tournament's two most important games.

The result marked China's second-lowest finish in Asian Games history, ahead of only its fifth-place finish at the 2014 Incheon Games.

China had gone unbeaten through the group stage before beating Saudi Arabia in the quarterfinals. But it then lost 97-77 to Japan in the semifinals and was unable to recover against Iran.

China again made a slow start on Sunday, falling 8-2 behind, but gradually found its rhythm and at one point took the lead. Iran, however, regained control in the latter stages by dominating the boards and creating second-chance opportunities.

China mounted a late comeback in the fourth quarter, with Li Hongquan scoring consecutively to cut the deficit to one point, but it could not complete the turnaround. Pang Zhenglin led China with 22 points, while Li added 12.

"Today, Iran were indeed a little stronger than us. That's the fact. It's all part of the experience," Li said.

He identified defensive rebounding as a major problem. "We gave up too many defensive rebounds and allowed the opponents too many second-chance opportunities. That was basically a problem throughout the game and, to a large extent, determined the way the game went," he said.

The defeat ended a summer campaign that had fallen short of China's goal of returning to the podium.

"There is definitely regret about this summer. Whether we win or lose, we wanted to stand on the podium, but we didn't achieve that today," Li said.

"But I'm still very proud of these brothers. We went through a lot of difficulties throughout the summer, and I'm also very grateful for this opportunity. Whatever happened, we fought on the court."

Head coach Guo Shiqiang said the result was disappointing but acknowledged that China had been outplayed. "It is indeed a pity. During the game, we did not do as well as our opponents, so we lost," Guo said.