They also knew PAOK and Lavrio continued to fly high!

One Laurel made for big things this year!

Performing brilliantly for most of the match and having polyphony and pluralism in the attack with six players with double-digit points (!), Costa Mexa’s team prevailed more easily than the final shows 86-76 of PAOK for the 4th matchday of the Stoiximan Basket League.

With this result, the home team rose – albeit temporarily – to third place in the standings with 3-1 record, leaving the “doubleheader of the north” in 7th place with 2-2. The first scorer for the winners was Vassilis Kavvadas with 16 points and 6 rebounds, while closely followed by Castaneda (14p.) and Helms (12 p.). For PAOK, their excellent performance went “wrong”. Beliauskas and Harrison with 23 and 22 points respectively.

The match:

The beginning of the match was quite balanced, with the two teams going hand in hand in the first three minutes of the match (9-9). Then, the Laurel put his foot on the… accelerator and with eight collected points by Helms, escaped with +7 for 19-12 in 6′. With a 6-0 run, mostly from the line of scrimmage, o PAOK temporarily reduced to a point (19-18), before Zaras came in the last minute and with five personal points made the 26-21 in the first quarter.

With… her very good defense as an ally, but also the three three-pointers per hand Castaneda and Ruck, the winning team jumped to +12 (37-25) at 14′. In fact, a little later, from a nail by Gromovs and a layup by Castanedas, the home team even reached at +16 (41-25 at 16′), with the “two-headed man of the north” unable to react, missing many shots and falling into mistakes. Kavvadas and Thorton kept the gap high, sending both teams to the locker room with the score at 52-35.

Kostas Mexa’s team continued from where they left off in the third quarter. With Kavvadas having no opponent in the “drawing room” and scoring two consecutive shots, Lavrio reached at +20 for 59-39 in the 23rd minute! Somewhere there, the Thessalonians reacted, and with them Fredrickson and Beliauskas in the foreground, they found rhythm in the attack, “gnawing” the difference up to them 10 (65-55) at 28′before Lavrio raised the gap again, closing out the period at +14 and 71-57.

In the last period, things did not change, since PAOK, despite their efforts and the baskets of Harrison, Tsiakma and Beliauskas, could not reduce more from 6 (82-76) at 39′, with the Laurel shaping it final score from the line of shots (86-76).

The quarters: 26-21, 52-35, 71-57, 86-76.