By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Jordan Loyd scored nine straight out of his game-high 20 points in four minutes down the stretch as Crvena Zvezda reacted to a Valencia comeback from down 12 to win 76 – 73 at home.
Thanks to this victory, Red Star snapped a five-game skid and improved to 5 – 10. Valencia dropped to 9 – 6.
As Loyd said: “It’s really emotional. We had a lot of close games in the last…forever, so it really feels good to pull one out and get a victory. We played together as a team, shared the ball. Everybody that stepped on the court did a helluva job. Always positive, but it’s about damn time we got a win.”
Loyd, who also had six assists against his former team, began his fourth-quarter outburst when Valencia got a 65 – 67 lead after returning from a 48 – 36 deficit they fell behind within the beginning of the second half.
While Zvezda went up 76 – 71 thanks also to a basket by Dejan Davidovac, Valencia missed a couple of open shots while committing multiple turnovers, thus failing to respond.
“In crunch time, we were a bit better, I would say”, said Zvezda’s coach Sasa Obradovic. “You know we’re very happy after this win. We really needed this, after all the unlucky situations we had. For a negative period of losing so many games, this is the right medicine. You could see that everybody was really contributing. The bench was there and I’m happy for all the guys.”
Louis Labeyrie had 15 points plus six rebounds and Klemen Prepelic scored 15 points as well for Valencia. Johnny O’ Bryant added 15 points for Zvezda.