ST. CATHARINES, Ont. — Andrew Nembhard had 19 points as Canada capped group play at the FIBA under-18 Americas Championship on Tuesday by routing Chile 97-60.
Emanuel Miller had 17 points and Jaden Bediako added 12 points and 12 rebounds for the Canadians, who are 3-0 after the preliminary round.
"I’ve been playing with and against Andrew (Nembhard) since Grade 7, so to get the opportunity to play with him again is awesome," said Canadian guard Joel Brown. "We’ve both known each other for such a long time so we know how to help each other out. There’s some things we do similarly and somethings we do differently, but it all just comes together and works. I love playing with him."
Maxwell Lorca led Chile with 11 points.
Canada opened the tournament with a 92-75 win over Argentina on Sunday, then defeated Ecuador 115-75 on Monday.
The Canadians will play Panama in the quarterfinals Thursday. The semifinals go Friday while the medal games are scheduled for Saturday.
The top four teams from the tournament at Meridian Centre earn berths at next summer’s U19 FIBA World Cup, which Canada won last year in Cairo.
Canada has never won the U18 FIBA Americas tournament, finishing runner up to the United States the previous two events. But the Canadians finally upset the U.S. in the semifinals of last summer’s World Cup en route to an historic gold medal, the first for Canada in a global basketball championship.
In other round-robin games Tuesday, Argentina downed Ecuador 82-61, the Dominican Republic thumped Panama 90-54 and the United States dismantled Puerto Rico 115-71.
The U.S. will meet Ecuador in its quarterfinal, Chile will take on Puerto Rico and Argentina will challenge the Dominican Republic.
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