By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Kendrick Nunn scored 23 points and Panathinaikos Athens beat Fenerbahce Beko 74 – 63 to bounce back to wins in EuroLeague and improve to 16 – 10. After its second straight loss, Fener is 15 – 11.
Panathinaikos led even by 15 points, 53 – 38 in the third period after completely turning the game around in the first half. Fenerbahce had made an impressive 7 – 19 entrance but the hosts strengthened their defense and closed the second period with a 11 – 0 run to go up 38 – 30 at the break.
Fener tried to come back and cut its deficit to five 59 – 54 in the fourth period with Johnathan Motley (16 points, five rebounds).
The Turkish side didn’t manage to get closer than that though since Panathinaikos’ defense and a couple of consecutive buckets by Nunn kept them at a distance.
The Turkish side didn’t manage to get closer than that though since Panathinaikos’ defense and a couple of consecutive buckets by Nunn kept them at a distance.
“Panos Kalaitzakis vs Calathes changed the game”
“We did not play well in offense. We started very bad. In the beginning, we gave a lot of space to Calathes. We made a lot of mistakes there. But I believe after we put Panos Kalaitzakis against Calathes, we changed the game,” Ergin Ataman praised the 25-year-old Greek forward, “Kalaitzakis played the perfect defense.”
Mathias Lessort provided 13 points and seven rebounds for Panathinaikos. Nick Calathes had 12 points and five assists for Fener, hitting the 2,000 mark in his EuroLeague career. Tarik Biberovic also scored 12.
“A very big thank you to the PAO people for such a warm welcome. It is always an incredible pleasure to step in OAKA,” mentioned the visiting head coach Sarunas Jasikevicius, a former EuroLeague champion with the Greens.
“About the game, like all big games, you can not lose concentration. You can not stop doing little things,” he added commenting on the losing effort in Athens.