By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Even though the Czechs didn’t have such a great preparation period, they seem completely unaffected by this. Coming off another easy victory over Estonia yesterday, Ginzburg’s team thoroughly beat Ukraine 64-78 in Riga. Things don’t look good for the Ukrainians and their new coach Yevgen Murzin, even though they weren’t as bad in their opening game against Lithuania as they were tonight and despite the fact that they tried to fight back in the fourth quarter.
“We were a completely different team from yesterday,” coach Murzin said after the game. “We were a little bit down, emotionally, after yesterday. We lost the fight early on and that started the chain of poor reactions.”
Jan Vesely had another solid game, tallying 19 points, 9 rebounds and 3 assists. Pavel Pumprla stacked 17 and Tomas Satoransky added another 15 with an impressive 8 boards and 6 assists. Petr Benda (2 rebounds, 2 assists) and Blake Schilb (4 rebounds, 5 assists) helped out with 8 apiece.
Commenting on Satoransky, coach Ginzburg had this to say about his player: “Tomas is the heart of this team. He is a great person, a great player and I think that he will have a great future. He is a coach’s player. But it was never about big numbers, it was being a coach’s player. Tomas, also, he can give you what you ask.”
For Murzin’s team, Kyrylo Fesenko stood out with 14 points and 8 boards, and Jerome Randle was close behind with 12 (plus 2 rebounds and 3 assists). Denys Lukashov tried to help out his team with another 9 points and 4 assists, and several other players chipped in but, ultimately, with no real impact on the end result.