If they had won the third Group D match against Japan on the 30th of last month and finished first in the group, they could have gone straight to the quarterfinals.
However, he was dragged throughout the game by Japan, the "second-tier" team, which sent no players to the FIBA World CupAs the team lost 77-83, it received a more difficult match.
Bahrain's performance at the tournament is one step below Choo Il-seung.
Bahrain held Thailand 76-60 in Group C, but lost significantly to the Philippines (61-89) and Jordan (60-84), falling to third place in the group.
The problem is that the opponent in the quarterfinals that they will meet if they beat Bahrain is China, the host country.
Home fans in China, where basketball is a popular sport, are expected to stage a one-sided cheering match for Chu Il-ho.
China's top center Zhou Qi was injured, but as it is a tournament held in his country, Chinese players are expected to play with all their might.
The biggest negative factor is the fact that the national team's rest time has been greatly reduced by receiving this match.
If they beat Bahrain, they will face China at 1 p.m. on the 3rd.
As of 11 p.m. on the 2nd, when the match against Bahrain ends, the match against China will begin exactly 14 hours later.
This happened because the match to decide which team will face China, the top team in Group B, will be held at the latest time in the quarterfinals.
On the other hand, the match between China and the winner was allocated at the earliest of the four quarterfinals.
After all, the Korean national team has to take a rest and play against China after the match against Bahrain on the 2nd.
Given that it is late at night when Bahrain ends, it is virtually necessary to wake up and prepare for the match against China.
For the national team, which has to pack immediately if it loses against Bahrain, it was challenged to prepare for the match against China somehow within this 14 hours.
If the team fails to pass the quarterfinals this time, the national team will be stigmatized for failing to reach the semifinals for the first time since the 2006 Doha Asian Games.
The only time South Korea failed to advance to the semifinals after participating in basketball events since the 1954 Manila Games was the 2006 Doha Games.
It was also the first and last time since the 1958 Tokyo Games that she failed to win a medal.
In this tournament, the national team is exposing the 'limits' of Korean basketball in many ways.
Since the FIBA Asia Cup in July last year, the only international competition scheduled until 2026 has been the Asian Games, but they have not been able to concentrate their efforts.
Choo, who is good at "forward basketball," became the head of the national team, but all of the forward resources to be used have disappeared due to various reasons such as concentration and injury of his team.
This happened at a time when 2m forwards with both mobility and height were produced the most in Korean basketball history.
Coach Choo, who had no choice but to give up his philosophy of forward basketball due to crying, has not been able to implement advanced basketball in a squad consisting only of guards and big men, unlike his inauguration ambition to follow the "global basketball flow."
Japanese players constantly moved in search of space and shot as many as 41 three points.
This was in stark contrast to Korea, which sent two big men to the court and mainly attempted under-the-goal attacks, and eventually won the victory after reversing the criticism that it was one step below in terms of power.
As Chu Il-seung, he has no choice but to show himself cruising through the "thorn field road" again to calm criticism caused by the defeat against Japan.