By Eurohoops team / info@eurohoops.net
Zalgiris Kaunas bid goodbye to the 2020-21 Turkish Airlines EuroLeague season on a positive note, after defeating Panathinaikos OPAP Athens 93-78 on Thursday for Round 34.
The Lithuanian squad ended their regular season run with a total 17-17 record after losing five of its last seven games, on Martin Schiller’s first campaign at the helm of the team. “Overall, very happy and extremely proud [of the young guys’ efforts]. Really extremely proud. This win cannot be underestimated playing with guys who just haven’t had so much run in EuroLeague, all my respect. Really proud.”, said the Zalgiris head coach after the game.
Lukas Lekavicius paced Zalgiris with 20 points, 4 rebounds against his former team, Thomas Walkup added 18 points, 5 assists and 4 rebounds for a game-high PIR performance of 29, while Rokas Jokubaits tapped 10 points. After a highly competitive first half, the hosts managed to keep a short 52-47 lead at halftime and never looked back in the second half, through nearly perfect defense.
On the other end of the court, Nemanja Nedovic led the Greens with 17 points, Ben Bentil had 13 and Ioannis Papapetrou added 9 points for Oded Kattash’s squad.
Panathinaikos (11-21) still has two games to end its EuroLeague duties for the season, against Zenit and CSKA Moscow next week, both away from home.
Photo: EuroLeague