By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Cory Higgins scored 25 points against his former club and Alex Abrines added 19 points as Barcelona beat CSKA 88 – 75 in Moscow in the battle between the first and second team of the EuroLeague standings.
Playing against his former team, Higgins didn’t hide his emotions: “It is always special here. Like I said, there were a lot of great memories for me here. It is great to see a lot of familiar faces but at the same time, we knew it was a huge game for us and all we were is focused to get the win. And thankfully, we came out on top again”.
Nick Calathes added 13 points, seven assists, and six rebounds for Barcelona that defeated the top-placed CSKA despite playing without star forward Nikola Mirotic plus Brandon Davies.
The Greek guard also hit two key back-to-back 3-pointers that gave the Blaugrana a 13-point lead, 62 – 75, early in the fourth period, its biggest advantage in the match.
There was no turning back from that deficit for CSKA. The hosts had already seen a 12-point lead second-quarter lead getting erased at halftime (40 – 42) and then struggled with their shooting, finishing with 21-50 2-pointers and 4-21 3-pointers.
Their dominance in rebounds (17 – 8 offensive boards) and their five fewer turnovers (7 – 12) weren’t translated to points. “I thought we found some matchups there that we liked and, ultimately, our guys hit some shots. In this game, you have to put the ball in the basket; sometimes it’s as simple as that”, said Barcelona coach Sarunas Jasikevicius.
Mike James finished with 18 points for CSKA and Nikola Milutinov had 15 points plus six rebounds, Tornike Shengelia posted 10 points and seven boards and Nikita Kurbanov scored 10.