By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Rodrigue Beaubois tied his career-high 29 points by shooting 7-10 triples as Anadolu Efes beat Olympiacos Piraeus 88 – 69 to get a consecutive win for the first time this EuroLeague season. The reigning champions kept Olympiacos at just three points in the final period while scoring 20 to turn a close game into a comfortable victory.
After multiple lead changes in the first half, the two teams went to the locker room tied at 44. With a score 68 – 66 at the end of the third quarter, Efes dropped eleven unanswered points to get a double-digit lead. Beaubois hit a triple for the 84 – 69 while Olympiacos looked completely blacked out and unable to even react as the hosts cruised towards crunch time with a big margin.
“It was a great win, it’s very important to win in front of our fans,” Beaubois said. “They were amazing. In the first half, we didn’t defend very well. I think when we came back in the second half, we did a way better job so that’s a great win tonight. I just tried to be aggressive for my team. As a team, we did a great job in the second half. If we want to win games that’s just what we need to do, to play more aggressively, we know we can do it.”
Vasilije Micic contributed 19 points and five assists to Efes win. He was the one to score the 3-pointer that gave the Turkish side its first double-digit lead in the match in the final period, when he drained the bucket for the 77 -66 with five minutes to play. Shane Larkin had 10 points and six assists.
Sasha Vezenkov (17 points) and Moustapha Fall (15 points) were the only Olympiacos players to stand out. The Reds failed to shoot the ball consistently from afar and committed more than double the turnovers than their opponents. In the end, they remained winless on the road this EuroLeague season after four away matches.
“We controlled the game for 30 minutes, we stayed in our game plan and that was why the score was tight, but the last quarter was a disaster for us,” Olympiacos coach Giorgos Bartzokas said. “We stopped playing offensively and defensively. We looked so disappointed and we stopped playing on both ends. That’s why we lost. Next game is on Friday so it’s now our new challenge. It will be difficult, against Maccabi, but we must forget this.”
All about Roddy Buckets
Anadolu Efes coach Ergin Ataman had the best to say for Beaubois and how his players defended in the decisive final quarter.
“Of course, it was a good win for us,” Ataman said. “We lost our last one in our home court, two weeks ago. And after we got a road victory last week against Alba in Berlin, to get this one was a very important thing for us. It was also important because tonight there were more than 10,000 fans with us that still believe in us. I think we had good concentration tonight, we made only 6 turnovers, and it was very important for our offense. We also got 21 assists, shared the ball, and tonight we found Rodrigue Beaubois. He was very hot on offense, with his shots, but others were not. Micic shot only 1 of 10, also Larkin was not very good in shooting, but Beaubois gave us so much when we had a problem on offense. I believe, in the last quarter especially, in the most important time, we made a great defense. We didn’t make the same mistakes we made in the previous games in rebounding. We took defensive rebounds and we took a great victory.”
Photo: EuroLeague Basketball