TimesofIndia.com at Singapore: For most of this week, moving between courts inside Singapore’s OCBC Arena for the 2026 NBA Rising Stars Invitational has almost become an exercise in repetition.The Japanese school wins easily. The Chinese team follows with another convincing game. Australia imposes itself physically. South Korea plays with a level of organization that rarely seems hurt.Various jerseys. Different opponents. However, the pattern hardly changes. It’s not just that these teams keep winning. That’s how they win.The ball rarely stays still for long. The defensive jump immediately becomes a new attack. The five players rotate almost instinctively, rarely looking towards the bench for direction. The press throughout the field refuses to let up, regardless of whether the game is tied or the lead is already out of reach.Looking from the field, it becomes increasingly difficult to separate individual talent from the system that produces it.That pattern followed in Velammal International School’s second match at Hall 3 on Thursday afternoon.Against South Korea’s Kyungbock High School, the sole representatives of India found themselves in the hunt not only for basketball, but also for the speed with which the Koreans handled every situation.
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By halftime, the contest was nearly out of whack.Whenever Velammal looked to patiently build from the back, another Korean defender arrived. The passing lanes disappeared almost instantly. The lost balls were recovered before the Indian players could react. Full-court pressing stifled possessions before they even started, while every defensive rebound immediately became a new attack.Each was a product of spacing, anticipation and time. Quick breaks came in waves. Even routine possessions were executed with incredible precision.The final score at the end reads 131-46.However, as the afternoon wore on, the scoreboard gradually became the least interesting part of the story. The bigger question lingered long after the final buzzer.Why do the same basketball nations continue to produce school teams that appear several steps ahead of everyone else?
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More than talent
From the stands, it was easy to assume that South Korea’s biggest advantage is physicality.Coach Sungin Lim saw it differently.“The physical balance of the Indian team is actually very good,” Lim told Timesofindia.com after the match. “Their fitness is also good. But compared to our players, the basics are missing. That’s where I saw the biggest difference.”His response echoed what had been going on for four quarters.Kyungbock were not simply bigger players. They defended as a unit.They trapped ball handlers before passing opportunities arose. Each jump triggered a new transition. Each player figured out where the next pass was going before it was played.The numbers reflected that collective understanding. Kyungbock finished with 54 rebounds, 31 assists and 26 steals, forcing Velammal into 40 turnovers.But Lim insisted that those numbers were just the final product.The most important thing is the volume of training, he said. “Students have school, they have classes and they have other activities. So within that limited time we try to maximize the training intensity.“Basketball is always a team game. If you don’t have stamina, you can’t express your skill or your fundamentals on the court.”Watching the Koreans continue to press with the same intensity in the fourth quarter, it was hard to disagree.
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Way out of school
Interestingly, Lim was quick to dismiss the idea that South Korea’s success simply comes from greater investment. In fact, he believes basketball gets less support today than it used to.“Korean basketball had a much stronger structure and infrastructure,” he explained.“Support is down from before.” Instead, South Korea focused on strengthening the ecosystem around its players.Elite basketball schools now work alongside club programs, expanding the player base while maintaining coaching standards.“It’s important to get more schools and clubs involved in the system,” Lim said. “You need more kids playing, but you also need the right coaches to help those kids reach their potential.”Just as important, the journey doesn’t stop when basketball school ends.Players move on to structured collegiate competition before advancing to the professional KBL, creating a pathway that extends beyond adolescence.High school is not the end. Many players first go through college basketball before entering the professional league.
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India out
Velammal head coach Shamsheer Basha spoke earlier this week about India’s need to improve their fundamentals. Thursday only reinforced that belief.“Our guys were lazy today,” Basha admitted before adding, “There was a lack of practice, our defense wasn’t good, our offense wasn’t good.”When asked what impressed him the most in South Korea, the answers came almost immediately.“Their outside shooting is very good, their communication is very good, their game planning is very good, their full court press is excellent.”“Our guys are moving slowly. They’re attacking right away. That experience is what we learned from this tournament. I’m going to come back and teach these guys what mistakes we made.”Velammal’s task became even more difficult with Fyodor Prem Athithan, one of India’s standout performers against Indonesia, restricted to just ten minutes.Without his primary point guard, much of the responsibility shifted to former NBA Academy India player Kushal Singh, who spent long periods initiating the attack rather than looking for his own points before finishing with 17.Sri Saran captain Vadivel Murugan continued to fight throughout, adding 16 points despite a growing deficit.Kushal, however, refused to measure the week by wins or losses.“I knew I had to get my teammates involved first,” he said. “It’s a team game. One player can’t do everything.”Looking back on the tournament, he spoke less about basketball and more about mentality.“As a team, we lack a lot of space. We lack the mindset. We don’t have enough mental strength. We give up too early.”Then came a line that perhaps best summed up why tournaments like the NBA Rising Stars Invitational are important.“Now we know our mistakes. We know where we are as individuals and as a team. So we can come back better.”
