By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Four players scored in double figures for Khimki Moscow that returned to EuroLeague wins by defeating Bayern Munich 87 – 74 in Germany. The Russian side had an outstanding 20-0 run that spanned from the end of the first half to the first minutes of the third period and pushed them towards their third victory in four games.
Alexey Shved finished with 19 points (1/9 triples) and nine assists while Anthony Gill added 17 points and six rebounds. Gill also dropped four consecutive points for the 68 – 84 with 2:52 remaining. It was a margin that ended Bayern’s comeback hopes after the German champs had made an 8-0 run to cut their deficit to 68 – 78 in the mid of the fourth period.
“It’s OK. What’s important that we won the game today because in the last years we were losing here. We are just happy to win here. That’s it,” Shved said when asked about his performance in the post-game EuroLeague TV flash interview.
Greg Monroe posted a season-high 18 points plus five rebounds four assists but also seven turnovers for Bayern. Vladimir Lucic had 12 points and five rebounds and Maodo Lo 12 points as well. Bayern dropped to 2-2.
Khimki center Devin Booker had 13 points against his former team and Janis Timma scored all of his 13 points in the first half.
Rimas Kurtinaitis pleased with his team’s performance on both ends.
Khimki coach Kurtinaitis saw his players putting on a balanced game to get the victory and, naturally, he was pleased with that.
“I am happy,” Kurtinaitis said. “We had too many turnovers in the first two quarters, 12, too many for a game like this. I am happy that my players understood that this is wrong. We controlled the game, were concentrated until the end and I think it is a good win. For sure, all the teams want to play defense, but they don’t play every time as their coaches want – if that happened, it would be 0-0! Anyway, we will put our offense and for sure, when we are scoring, we are confident and for sure, we played good defense tonight. We have no VTB League games at the end of this week, so we will get one day off, for sure.”
Photo: EuroLeague Basketball