By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Baskonia had things in control from start to finish, as the hosts got the 78-62 against Milan.
The Italian club’s woes continue, as they couldn’t even tie the score at any point of the game, trailing from the first play of the night and never managing to be really competitive on their 7th straight defeat.
Darius Thompson with 15 points and 7 assists, plus Daulton Hommes with 11 points led a balanced offensive effort for Baskonia.
“I am just happy for the win”, Thompson said after the end of the game.
“We had a solid game, we had some problems against Davies in the second half, but I am happy with our defense”, added coach Joan Penarroya, as his team jumped to a positive record (6-5).
Milan got 23 points from Brandon Davies and 14 points from Devon Hall.
The return of Billy Baron didn’t help as he was out of synch after being injured. He didn’t score and the Italians finished the night with just 8/28 threes.
Plus newcomer Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot wasn’t used in the second half after a hit on his head, for precautionary reasons.
“We are in deep trouble, we lost Cabarrot practically after one quarter, the decisions of our guard it is what it is, we have our issues, we try to protect our position in the Italian league and hope for better days in the EuroLeague”, admitted coach Ettore Messina with his team dropping to a 3-8 record and still missing key players including starting point guard Kevin Pangos.
“You can’t win without guards and maybe one or two may have a tough night as it happened with Mitrou-Long who is a rookie in the EuroLeague. He had good games, but today he hit the wall, he is learning and hopefully, he will learn”, Messina added about Naz Mitrou Long who, like Baron, finished the night without scoring in 23 minutes.