Kim Sun-hyung and Yang HongSeok, veteran players of the South Korean national team, are among 11 Korean Basketball League players, who are now undergoing quarantine back in Seoul due to COVID-19 infection.
The 6’2” Kim and the 6’6” Yang were supposed to spearhead the Koreans’ campaign against the Philippines, India and New Zealand in the FIBA World Cup 2023 Asian Qualifiers’ February window at the Araneta Coliseum in a week’s time.
But the presence of Kim and Yang when the Korean squad plays in Manila is now doubtful.
All 24 members of the Korean national quintet have gone through RT-PCR tests. If any more players are found positive, they will no longer proceed to training camp in Goyang.
From there, the coaching staff will select 14 players from those who have negative results.
Because of this, the Koreans will have to face the Gilas Pilipinas national men’s team without Yang and Kim, who was also a member of the gold medal-winning team at the 2014 Asian Games.