By Johnny Askounis/ info@eurohoops.net
A 24-6 finishing run lifted U-BT Cluj Napoca over Darussafaka, 103-101, and to the Basketball Champions League Round of 16.
Cuban Karel Guzman, the top performer against Fribourg Olympic pushing the Romania champions into the Regular Season back in September, resurfaced as the key player handing his side the direct ticket to the next round. Including nine points down the stretch, the season-high 26 points fell just a couple of points shy of career-best carried over from Argentina. Seven rebounds, five assists, four steals, and one block stuffing his stat sheet generated a 37 efficiency rating.
Brandon Brown and Dustin Hogue followed with 16 points each in Wednesday’s Gameday 6 fixture held at Volkswagen Arena Istanbul.
The team coached by Mihai Silvasan, undefeated sitting 11-0 in Romania’s LNBM and coming off eight wins in a row across all competitions, extended the streak to clinch the top seed. Coming up next after the 5-1 run in Group G, a brand new six-game double-legged round-robin schedule in Group K along with Unicaja and two more teams advancing through the Play-Ins.
Turkish point guard Dogus Ozdemiroglu poured a team-high 19 points behind 5/8 field goals, including 3/6 from beyond the arc. British Gabriel Olaseni tallied 18 points with 8/9 field goals. However, they combined for 12 of the 21 team turnovers.
The team guided by Selcuk Ernak going down to 2-4 ranked third in the group. Up next, Hereda San Pablo Burgos in a best-of-three Play-In series with the home-court advantage belonging to the back-to-back BCL champions.
Postgame press conference:
Photo Credit: Basketball Champions League