“Why do they keep looking for Bass only…” Coach Moon Kyung-un voices frustration: “It seems the players have gotten used to it” [Suwon on-site]

*This content was translated by AI.

It was a painful defeat in their home opener. Moon Kyung-un, head coach of Suwon KT, identified the team’s monotonous offense, which relied excessively on its ace, as the reason for the loss.

KT lost 76-81 to Seoul Samsung in the opening game matchup of the 2026-2027 KCC Pro Basketball season, held at Suwon KT Sonicboom Arena on the 4th.

On this day, top scorer Paris Bass fought hard with 35 points, 11 rebounds, and 3 assists, but recorded six turnovers.

Above all, perimeter support was severely lacking. Kang Sung-wook attempted 10 three-pointers but made only one, while shooter Jeon Seong-hyun also managed just one out of nine attempts, as the team suffered serious struggles from beyond the arc. The team’s overall three-point shooting percentage was 8/37 (approximately 21.6%), and their field goal percentage was 29/82 (approximately 35.4%), hitting rock bottom. This was the backdrop for KT’s self-inflicted collapse despite leading the rebounding battle by 10 boards, 44-34.

In a post-game press conference, Coach Moon summarized, “We were ahead in rebounding stats, but we lost because we were outperformed in field goal percentage.”

Coach Moon expressed deep regret over the flow of the game in the early stages. He noted, “Because we chose to direct our offense only toward Bass from the start of the first quarter, Bass had to run as if it were the end of the fourth quarter, leading to a decline in stamina.” He added, “We should have led the game in the first quarter, but instead, we ended up chasing the opponent throughout the entire game.”

The absence of Kim Sun-hyung, who is on long-term injury leave, was also painful. Coach Moon stated, “With Kim Sun-hyung absent from the frontcourt, Kang Sung-wook had to take on the role of orchestrating the game. We practiced how to utilize Bass and how to exploit space on the opposite side of mismatches, but we failed to execute these in actual play.” He pointed out, “Opposing teams will certainly focus their defense solely on Bass going forward. We have only played one game so far, but this is a challenge we must definitely overcome.”

Regarding scenes where domestic players hesitated to shoot, he observed coldly, “It seems the players have developed a habit of looking only for Bass, similar to when Bass was previously with KT.” He continued, “All our players possess the ability to utilize mismatches. While it is understandable to look for the ace in crucial moments, our ball handling was not smooth, and errors compounded the problem.”

Finally, Coach Moon vowed to bounce back, stating, “We will prepare thoroughly again so that we can definitely break away from a monotonous offense focused on just one player.”

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*This content was translated by AI.