IT might not have been its star's best scoring nights but Slovenia remained red-hot.
Luka Doncic's 19-point performance on 5-of-17 shooting proved enough in Slovenia's 92-77 rout of Cape Verde in Okinawa, Japan on Wednesday.
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Coming off the bench, Klemen Prepelic was the next man up for the world No. 7 side with 18 markers, seven assists, and four boards.
Even after leading by as much as 24 at one stage, Slovenia tactician Aleksander Sekulic said his team was far from its best ahead of the second round.
"My goal was to talk to the players in terms of getting into the game with the right mindset. This is the part I didn't completely succeed at," Sekulic said.
"I think the focus was not on the level of the game, on the level of the World Championship. But in the second half I think we changed the mindset and played a much, much better game," he added.
The scores:
Slovenia (92) - Doncic 19, K. Prepelic 18, Nikolic 11, B. Prepelic 11, Tobey 9, Hrovat 7, Dragic 6, Dimec 6, Cebasek 3, Samar 2, Glas 0, Blazic DNP.
Cape Verde (77) - B. Gomes 17, Mendes 10, Lima 9, E. Tavares 9, Correia 8, I. Almeida 7, da Rosa 5, W. Tavares 5, Mendonca 3, J. Almeida 2, K. Gomes 2, Coronel DNP.
Quarterscores: 24-21; 45-38; 69-55; 92-77.
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