By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Zalgiris Kaunas’ fighting spirit especially at home can’t be denied. On the contrary, it was demonstrated against ALBA Berlin admirably on the way to a big 88-81 win with the final score not reflecting the story of the game, which ended up being the biggest comeback victory in the history of Zalgiris and their 200th win in the Euroleague.
Zalgiris made things happen only in the last period with Keenan Evans providing the spark with 15 points on 5/8 threes.
“The fans, again, they were amazing tonight”, said Evans. “They helped us get our groove back and stayed with us until the end, even when we were down by 20 points”.
Edgaras Ulanovas was the top scorer with 21 points and Ignas Braizdekis made clutch shots for a total of 14 points. Rolands Smits also added 14 points.
“We didn’t play good”, stated Ulanovas. “We played very bad, to be honest, so we need to learn from it”.
Jaleen Smith with 14 points led a balanced effort from the German side, which started impressively but didn’t end the way they would want.
ALBA had a great start, leading by 20 (43-23) in the second period and having a 12-point advantage at halftime (44-32), while the hosts shot just 33% from the floor.
Zalgiris managed to fight back and trimmed ALBA’s lead to seven at the end of the third quarter (61-54) thanks to the first three-pointer and first points of Evans in the game.
Gabriele Procida answered back (64-54) to start the last period but with three more threes by Evans, Zalgiris tied the game at 69 with five minutes left and finally got a 71-70 lead thanks to Smits.
Luke Sikma answered with back-to-back buckets (74-71) and Braizdekis with a goal foul tied the score again (74-74). He followed with a big step-back three (77-74), which proved to be the start of an 11-2 run (85-76).
As Zalgiris coach Kazys Maksvytis said: “We deserved this win but the bad start of the game almost cost us. But thank God for the fourth quarter, in which we changed everything in this game. We tried to find Keenan [Evans]. Keenan, then ‘Ula’ [Edgaras Ulanovas]. I am so very happy, this has been one of the most unbelievable [comebacks].”
ALBA managed to trim the final point difference, but couldn’t get into shooting distance. On the contrary, Ulanovas made a three at the buzzer for the final score, as both teams now share a 3-3 record.
ALBA Berlin head coach Israel Gonzalez admitted that in the end, his team should have done better: “I am happy with our game until the last quarter. We were playing very good basketball but we have to analyze what happened in the last quarter. I think we didn’t make a lot of mistakes on defense but I remember a couple of shots in which we could have done a little bit more. The rest were impressive threes and when the other team plays as well as they played in the last quarter, we cannot do another thing than congratulate them, that’s all”.