Coached by Kim Sang-shik, South Korea will next face world No. 10 Russia on Monday, also in Wuhan. Russia defeated 33rd-ranked Nigeria 82-77 earlier Saturday.

"We'll have to break down today's loss and figure out what went wrong," Kim said. "Against Russia, we'll make sure we won't repeat the mistakes we made today."

The top two teams from the group will advance to the next round, while the bottom two teams will be relegated to the classification stage.

South Korea is looking for its first world championships win since 1994. South Korea shot itself out of the game in the first quarter.

Kim Sun-hyung's layup in transition gave South Korea its first lead of the game at 11-9, but Argentina went on a 13-0 run over the next

6:10 to close out the quarter up 22-11. South Korea missed its next six shots from the field and went just 5-of-18 from the floor in the opening 10 minutes.

South Korea got to within 28-22 midway through the second quarter, before shooting woes bit them again. Argentina put together another 13-0 run while South Korea missed a half dozen shots in a row.

South Korea found itself down 43-28 at halftime, with only nine field goals made after 20 minutes.

Argentina drained four shots behind the arc to start the third quarter, three of them by Laprovittola. Marcos Delia's jumper gave Argentina its biggest lead of the night up to that point at 57-35 with 6:39 remaining in the third, and the outcome was never in doubt -- not with the way South Korea was shooting.

Argentina took a 71-44 lead into the final quarter, and the lead ballooned to 82-48 after another three pointer by Laprovittola 2:36 into the frame.

The South American side went to its bench early and cruised to an easy win.

Ratliffe had 12 of South Korea's 16 points in the third quarter, but it wasn't nearly enough to bring the team out of the hole it dug itself into in the first half. Only some late three pointers made the final score more respectable. (Yonhap)