By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Olimpia Milano bounced back to EuroLeague wins by beating Zalgiris Kaunas 74 – 70 on the road in a postponed game for Round 17. The Italian team improved to 16-7 to remain third in the standings while bottom-placed Zalgiris fell to 3-19 after suffering its ninth straight defeat.
Malcolm Delaney led all scorers with 20 points and 4-6 triples while Troy Daniels had 15 points on 4-9 3-pointers in an otherwise mediocre shooting performance (12 3-pointers after a season-high 34 attempts) for Milano. The Red Shoes weren’t particularly accurate on 2-pointers either (14-29) but dominated the offensive boards 14 – 3 with Kyle Hines leading the charge by grabbing five of his 10 rebounds in opposing territory.
“They gave us a lot of shots on the weak side. We were getting into the paint. We were getting good shots – we weren’t making a lot of them, but I think we made the few that we needed to,” Delaney said. “That was just their game plan; they wanted to keep us out of the paint and force us to shoot threes and took them. We weren’t making too many shots early, we had to try to figure out a way to get some stops and close the game out. And having guys like [Kyle Hines and Sergio Rodriguez] that have been through it all the time, we’re pretty confident at the end of games.”
These boards helped Hines become EuroLeague’s new all-time leader in offensive rebounds after passing retired Real Madrid captain Felipe Reyes.
Hines also made the basket that put Milano up 65 – 72 with 27 seconds to play when he dunked the ball in transition to close the game with 10 points. Tyler Cavanaugh hit a 3-pointer on the other end but Devon Hall secured Milano’s win with a pair of free throws.
Lukas Lekavicius had 16 points and Cavanaugh scored 13 for Zalgiris was up 55 – 53 at the beginning of the fourth period after 30 minutes of a mostly close game with multiple lead changes. Milano went ahead 57 – 62 and then the hosts tied the game at 64 with five minutes to play.
Delaney hit the triple and his team then scored five unanswered points to move up by seven with Hines’ slam, a decisive three-possession distance.
Sergio Rodriguez added 10 points plus five assists for Milano.
“I’m really sad that we lost the game in front of great fans,” Zdovc said. “I really think we deserved to win tonight. But we didn’t. Some rebounds, some open shots we missed. And these details in the end, decided the winner.”
Experience that mattered in the last lap
Milano coach Ettore Messina saw Delaney, Hines and Chacho pulling off plays that decided the game’s outcome during the final minutes.
“Zalgiris played I think a good game trying to take advantage of their mismatches,” Messina said. “I think Coach Zdovc organized very well their offense. They tried to post Ulanovas a lot that for us was a tough matchup because if we go bigger, now we have less offense. If we go smaller to have more offense, we pay underneath. I think we managed to arrange that to stay in single coverage and without giving up threes in rotation, [which is] something that happened in the first game. And my veterans made some big plays down the stretch. Malcolm [Delaney] hit some big shots, we got some good one-on-one situations by our veterans and we managed to come out with the win.”