By Eurohoops Team / info@eurohoops.net
Zalgiris Kaunas got a vital, 82 – 69 win against Panathinaikos OPAP Athens in Round 19 of the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague, despite being down by double-digits in the first half. Currently both teams have the same record at 8-11, but Zalgiris has the tiebreaker.
Even though, at the start of the second period, Zalgiris was down by double-digits (82-69) as DeShaun Thomas and James Gist were scoring down low, they found the way to comeback and eventually end the first half at 33-37.
An impressive 13-0 run by Zalgiris at the start of the second half, sparked by Aaron White, put Sarunas Jasikevicius’ team up by nine points (46-37) and forced coach Rick Pitino to call a time-out. Panathinaikos, however, responded as Konstantinos Mitoglou was grabbing offensive rebounds and scoring down low and by the end of the third period, the score was 52-51.
Another 13-5 run in the beginning of the fourth period for Zalgiris, sparked by Nate Wolters, was more than enough to hold off the visiting Greek team. With five minutes remaining, the hosts were up by nine points (65-56), and the visitors could not find ways to score and comeback. Zalgiris kept on scoring, highlighted by White’s emphatic alley-oop and the lead increased to 15 points (76-61) ending Panathinaikos’ hopes for a potential comeback.
White was very explosive all night long, scoring in a variety of ways. He finished the game with a game-high 15 points, while Wolters added 10 points and three assists. As for Panathinaikos, Sean Kilpatrick scored 11 points in his EuroLeague debut, but he struggled with his shot, shooting a poor 5/14 from the field.
Rick Pitino talked about his team’s great first half and disappointing second half: “Since I came aboard, the first half was the best we’ve played. Then we reverted back to why we lose games on the road, instead of doing the right things. It’s hard for them to learn the right lessons. They broke down defensively, and played like undisciplined players. I’m really pleased with the first half, really disappointed in the second half.”
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