He “cleaned” Maccabi and Baskonia hopes for the play-ins

Reaching +11 in the first period, Baskonia defeated Maccabi 95-85 in neutral Belgrade for the 16th matchday of the Euroleague and with a 7-9 record remained in the top ten and hopes for the play-ins, leaving the Israelis at 4-12 and far from the privileged positions.

Pablo Lasso’s players with accuracy in three-pointers in the first half reached double-digit differences and in the second at +19, they were pressed in the fourth period, but found the solutions in the opposing racket for the final victory.

Leading the winners were Howard with 29, Moneke with 17, Sendekerskis with 12 and Rogavopoulos with 11 points (2/4 2-pointers, 2/8 3-pointers, 1/2 shots, 7 rebounds). For the Israelis, Sorkin, Yokoubaitis with 22 and Blatt, Howard with 14 points stood out.

The match

The two teams were finding the solutions in both rackets and the lead started to change in the first minutes of the match. Blatt’s two straight 3-pointers made it 6-0 and +5 for the Israelis, but Hall helped spark a 5-0 run by the Basques for 15-15 and Howard’s two straight 3-pointers tied the lead for the ‘people’s team’ ». Baldwin’s three-pointer brought +3 for Pablo Lasso’s team. Rogavopoulos helped fuel a 10-0 Baskonia run to make it 23-34 in the first quarter.

Back-to-back 3-pointers by Baskonia at the start of the second period made it +15 for the Basques, who had a very good percentage from outside the line at 6.75. The guests’ many solutions, this time also inside the opponent’s racket, kept them at +13 to +15. Howard cut to -11 and Blatt’s 3-pointer cut to -10, but Baskonia responded with a 5-0 run for a 43-57 halftime lead.

Maccabi had 12/13 two-pointers, 3/10 three-pointers and 11/12 shots. Baskonia had 12/17 2-pointers, 9/14 3-pointers, 6/8 shots and 18 rebounds.

Baskonia correctly put the ball in the Israeli basket and maintained +14 to +16 at the start of the third period. Sorkin took matters into his own hands at that point and helped a 6-0 run for the -9 inside the Basque racket. Moneke responded with a personal run of 5-0 for Baskonia’s +14, Howard’s three-pointer brought +15 and that of Sendekerskis +17 for 60-75 in the third quarter.

Howard with a personal 4-0 run at the beginning of the fourth period brought +14 and Rogavopoulos’ three-pointer +16. Howard’s three-pointer brought +19 for Baskonia. Cohen assisted in a 7-0 Maccabi run for -14, but Moneke responded with a personal 4-0 run for +18. Yokubaitis “woke up” and with a personal 5-0 run reduced to 77-90 and with a new 4-0 of their own, Maccabi reduced to -10 at 1’22’, while the Basques only shot three-pointers and missed most of the times. A miss by both in the final minute kept it 85-95 as the final score.

The quarters: 23-34, 43-57, 60-75, 85-95

The statistics