Zalgiris celebrates first victory in Euroleague 0

Ervinas Spūdys, LithuaniaBasketball.com

Zalgiris Kaunas took their first Euroleague victory at home against Brose Baskets Bamberg 81-70 (28-21, 18-22, 14-10, 21-17).

The first half started nervously for Zalgiris. The home side just couldn’t find a cure for Brose Baskets attacks and at one point was trailing by seven, but then Aleksandr Trifunovic asked for a timeout and managed to get the Greens back in the game, ending the first quarter ahead 28-21.

In the second period, the visitors stayed close, but the Brose Baskets bench was quickly given a technical foul, although the hosts didn’t use their chance to get away.

The first half of the game ended with two consecutive Zalgiris turnovers, despite that, an impressive three-pointer from Sonny Weems gave Zalgiris a 46-43 edge after the first twenty minutes.

Two teams struggled to score in the third quarter, when both of them stepped up on defense. The visitors scored only 10 points in 10 minutes, leaving themselves trailing 53-60.

In the decisive part of the match, the Brose Baskets improved their game and with six minutes to go, closed the gap to just two. This time Zalgiris made the right conclusions and in the end didn’t let a win to slip away, celebrating their first victory in 2011-2012 Euroleague season.

Former Raptors’ swingman Sonny Weems led the hosts with 22 points, Marko Popovic added 13, Milovan Rakovic 12, Ty Lawson and Mantas Kalnietis finished the game with 8.

For the visitors, Brose’s forward Predrag Suput had his game high of 19 points, Marcus Slaughter scored 11, while Julius Jenkins added 10.

Chris Fleming (Brose Baskets Bamberg head coach): “At first I want to congratulate Trifunovic’s team, because they showed strong character in a difficult situation. One of the most important facts in this game is that Weems got away from us in the first half, I think especially those five points before the break hurt us. They just did a better job and got away with a win.”

Aleksandr Trifunovic (Zalgiris Kaunas head coach): “First of all, talking about the game, of course the victory is important and we’re glad about it. But what’s more important and makes us happy, it’s our fans. They stood of their seats before the game and sang the national anthem. That was a special moment, which helped us to win. So far I’m with the team for only seven days, so I need more time to make our play better. I believe this team can achieve really good results in this season.”