Guandong Southern Tigers held off Shandong Golden Stars with a 95-81 opening victory to claim the opening game of the series in the first round of the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA) league quarterfinals on Monday.

Former Creighton University player Justin Carter paced the Southern Tigers with a team-high 24 points. He also grabbed 9 rebounds and dished out 7 assists - getting the much needed help from the Chinese basketball superstar and former NBA player Yi Jianlian.

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Yi, registered a double-double game performance of 16 points and 11 rebounds to go, along with 4 assists during the game.

Zhu Fangyu and Zhou Peng added 16 points and 13 points respectively, while Ren Junfei contributed 12 points for the winners.

Former Miami Heat player Michael Beasley finished the game with a double-double game production of game-high 32 points and 17 rebounds. His American-Ukrainian teammate Eugene Jeter chipped in 22 points, 5 rebounds and 3 assists for Shandong.

The Southern Tigers, who finished the regular season posting 28 wins and 10 losses, controlled most of the game.  They finished the opening quarter of the game leading by six points 28-22 and managed to limit the scoring production of the Golden Stars by 14 points only in the second quarter. The two teams went to the locker room with Guandong on top 50-36 at the end of the first half of the game

Shandong made a run in the third quarter with a 23-18 run to trim down the gap by a single digit 68-59 going into the final quarter of the match.

In the final twelve minutes of the game, the Southern Tigers were able to capitalize with their advantage, scoring 27 points while capping Shandong with just 22 points ending the game.

Guandong outrebounded their opponent with a 59-41 advantage including the team's 19 offensive rebounds. The victors had a steady 78.6 percent free-throw shooting going 22-of-28.

TagsMichael Beasley, Yi Jianlian, cba