Chen Jianghua had game-high 20 points and five rebounds to lead CBA's Guangdong Hongyuan youth team past Taiyuan Technology University 86-68, winning the CUBA vs CBA youth team basketball tournament in Wuhan on Wednesday.

Point guard Chen nailed the first six points and ignited their fight back at the second half by dishing out two assists in the last quarter as Guangdong Hongyuan won its six straight match at the eight-team event.

"I am really happy to win tonight. We are the only youth team in the semi-finals, and we proved the best young players in China," said Chen.

Guanddong took the command from the very beginning to lead 19-18 in the first quarter, and extended its lead to 38-26 by the end of the first half.

Taiyuan fought back from the third quarter and cut the deficit to 59-49 by the end of the third quarter.

Chen, who was regarded as the player that would join NBA star Yao Ming in the Chinese national team at the 2008 Olympic Games, stole the ball from Wuhan's guard Sun Zhichao with 20 seconds to go and made a slum dunk to seal the win.

Zhou Peng contributed 18 points and five rebounds to Guangdong, While Sun Zhichao led Taiyuan with 15 points and six rebounds.

Earlier in the day, CUBA defending champion Huaqiao University beat Shandong Science University 74-67 to take the third place.

Jiang Xinxin hit game-high 19 points and seven rebounds to lead the Huaqiao University team, and teammate Zhang Jiabin added 11 points and seven rebounds. Li Hai scored 13 points and grabbed five rebounds for Shandong.

In the women's side, Gu Xiaoli made a winning two-point shot, leading Huazhong Science University team edge the Liaoning youth team 68-67 to win the title on Tuesday.

The Guangdong youth team nipped the Tianjin Financing University team 87-85 to place third.

In a bid to improve the standard of Chinese basketball, CBA and CUBA launched the tournament, which will run through Wednesday. Four top-ranked teams each in CUBA and CBA took part in the tournament.
 
(Xinhua News Agency January 5, 2006)