China and South Korea prevailed while Japan won a tough game Saturday in the women's basketball preliminary round at the Asian Games.

Defending champions China won the second game by beating Thailand 98-43, while South Korea kept unbeaten with a 98-44 win over India.

The pair of powerhouse will meet on Monday in the last match of the group to decide the winners of the round.

Japan edged off Chinese Taipei 69-59 for the top place in the other group.

All the 12 players of China scored in the lop-sided match with five players scored over 10 points. Thailand's Charothai Suksomwong had the game-high 16 points.

Kim Danbi had 21 points for South Korea, which lost to China 77-53 in the semi-finals four years ago in Doha, Qatar.

Chinese Taipei looked not as concentrated as they did in the record-breaking 127-23 win over Maldives on Thursday.

They traild from the very beginning of the match and never overturned the table, as the Japanese dominated the board by 36-27.

Japan were better off on almost every aspect of the court against the runners-up of Doha Asian Games, and easily fought back the surge-up in the fourth quarters.

Seven teams participated in the women's pool with top two teams of each group advancing directly into the semi-finals.

(Xinhua News Agency November 21, 2010)