Montakit Fuenlabrada extend their great start of Liga Endesa with a victory over Baskonia. Madrid team marches 4-0 and equals its best historic start
Montakit Fuenlabrada defeated Baskonia 80-75 and remains undefeated in four rounds of Liga Endesa after smothering the Vitorian team with a strong defense and resisting the reaction of Georgian Tornike Shengelia led by Georgian Tornike Shengelia (20 points, 6 rebounds).
Montakit Fuenlabrada of Nestor’ Che’ Garcia once again made the defensive intensity his flag and dominated from the outset a match that allows him to equal his best historic start in the Liga Endesa, a 4-0 like the one he won in the 2009-10 campaign. Good data for his twentieth season in the competition.
The home side, with the scoring spread widely (15 points for Mexico’s Paco Cruz, 13 from Croatian Marko Popovic, 12 from Congolese Christian Eyenga and 10 from Briton Gabe Olaseni) dwarfed Baskonia, who nonetheless showed their Euroleague team cache at the last minute, despite being without coach Pablo Prigioni, sent off by double
Montakit Fuenlabrada began as usual since the arrival of’ Che’ Garcia: suffocating behind and relying on a resolute Eyenga in attack, who put the first five points of the initial 14-2 (min. 5) that forced the Argentine coach Pablo Prigioni -who made his debut in ACB as a player in Fuenlabrada- to ask for time.
Baskonia improved with the renewal of the quintet, but watched them walk through the ring clear trays, while the pequeños of the local team penetrated their defense like a knife in butter and kept their difference at the end of the first quarter (20-8). The 14-8 home in rebounds and the 0 of 6 visitors in the throws of three points said it all.
A negative partial of the baskonistas from the 6,75 meters line that broke the Argentinean Carlos Delfino, later imitated by the Brazilian Marcelinho Huertas and the German Johannes Voigtmann, to which joined Shengelia that made useless the local defense by the interior (8 points and 5 rebounds for him in this quarter) and hung from the hoop when scoring 26-22 (min. 16).
However, the Montakit Fuenlabrada, led by Popovic and Cruz for the accumulation of fouls of the Venezuelan’ Super Mouse’ Vargas, did not lose his calm and focused on converting his attacks despite the great deal of suffering Shengelia was causing him to suffer inside and was still ahead of the rest (36-31).
Pablo Prigioni’s men were returning from the interval with the intention of finishing the comeback, but they met with the robberies of Vartgas that allowed the locals to run, with mate of Eyenga and triple of Popovic that brought the distance back to the ten (45-35, min. 23).
The party continued thanks to the closing of the local rebound, Popovic’s three pointers and the Croatian’ alley-oop’ for the Latvian Rolands Smits, which added fire to the Fuenlabreña boiler (52-39, m. 26).
Prigioni found no solutions and his protests intensified to the point of receiving a double technique by insistently claiming a foul in a rebound under local hoop. After their exit, the home advantage climbed to 18 goals at the end of the quarter-final (65-47).
However, Shengelia was not willing to let the locals look so happy and premiered the final period with a triple and a basket, the Frenchman Vincent Poirier followed him with an’ alley-oop’ and a mate (67-56, min. 33) that put a point of anxiety in the Montakit Fuenlabrada, which was carrying faults and could not find a way to stop the
With ten points clear, Nestor’ Che’ Garcia had to use the Popovic-Cruz duo again to raise the ball because of Vargas’s accumulation of fouls and without Smits and Olaseni, also with four personnel, the Madrid players lost their inner strength, while Shengelia reduced the income to seven goals (69-62, min. 35).
The Baskon defence appeared when it was most needed and the Vitorian team was three points (70-67). But when the worst were yours, Paco Cruz appeared to give air to his team, first with a 2+1 and then forcing another foul for 75-70, which was still in the scoreboard with 26.1 seconds to the end.
Ilimane Diop was a free-kick winner and Baskonia – with Sergio Valdeolmillos in the role of head coach due to Prigioni’s absence – was playing with the staff, whose shots were scored by Gabe Olaseni’ s’ Fuenla’ British pivot.
The Vitorian response was a triple from Latvian Janis Timma (77-75) with 13 seconds ahead and the local throw-in after dead time was a clarified for O’ Leary who scored, was fouled and also converted (80-75) with seven seconds ahead. Shengelia played for the triple, spit by the ring that dictated the sentence of the fourth victory fuenlabreña.
80 – Montakit Fuenlabrada (20+16+29+15): Vargas (4), Popovic (13), Eyenga (12), O’Leary (9), Olaseni (10) -quinteto inicial-, Rupnik (4), Cruz (15), Smits (11), Sekulic y Llorca (2).
75 – Baskonia (8+23+16+28): Huertas (14), Janning (5), Timma (6), Diop (10), Shengelia (20) -quinteto inicial-, Granger (6), Poirier (8), Voigtmann (3), Vildoza y Delfino (3).
Efe content – ACB Photo
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