By Bilal Baran Yardımcı / info@eurohoops.net
Fenerbahce Beko center Johnathan Motley left behind a poor performance in a loss to Olympiacos Piraeus via an 18-point outing as his team, and himself, bounced back to form against ALBA Berlin.
“I had to lead and take control,” Motley said to Eurohoops following the 101-86 win of Fener over ALBA. “I had to be an example to my teammates, I had to do what I had to do for this team to be successful.”
“It was a good match,” Motley added. “We are happy that things are back on track. We needed this. Everyone is feeling good right now.”
The game vs. ALBA was nothing short of a must-win affair for Fener, especially considering the hard defeat to Olympiacos. Motley had additional personal reasons to want to play big, since he had a season-low six points on 2-9 shots vs. the Reds.
He was dominant right from the start against ALBA, scoring 11 points in the first quarter as Fener took a 31-21 lead. He finished with 18 while shooting seven out of 13 from the field while four of his teammates also scored in double figures.
“I think one of the best points is that there are so many players that we can trust,” Motley said. “Nigel [Hayes-Davis], me, Nick [Calathes], Scottie [Wilbekin], Dyshawn [Pierre], [Devin] Booker… We have a lot of veterans who know the game and have the potential to do great things. When you put all these together and play good defense, great things can happen.”
“We just have to be better,” Motley concluded. “We haven’t been playing very well lately, I’m happy we found our chemistry tonight. We are responsible for our performance, we are expected to go out on the field and play our game because Fenerbahçe is a top team with top-level players. We are trying to meet the expectations on us.”