First punch invigorates

CSKA – Olympiacos Piraeus: 88-82 (+6)

CSKA: Lundberg (16 + 3 as + 2 st + 4 pf), Voigtmann (3 + 2 st), Clyburn (29 + 3 rb + 4 as), Kurbanov (10 + 3 rb + 3 as), Shved (10 + 2 as) – start; Bolomboy (16 + 5 rb), Khomenko (DNP), Ukhov (0), Ivlev (DNP), Hackett (4 + 3 rb + 2 as + 2 st), Antonov (DNP), Faried (0)…

Olympiacos: Walkup (6 + 6 as + 5 pf), Dorsey (32 + 4 rb + 2 as + 3 to), Fall (6 + 5 rb), Vezenkov (6 + 5 rb + 2 st), Papanikolaou (5) – start; Lountzis (0), Larentzakis (2 as), Sloukas (2), Martin (5), Printezis (4), Jean-Charles (11 + 6 rb + 2 bs), McKissic (5 + 2 as)…

Big congratulations to our team. All of the players showed tremendous wish to go out there and fight, to cover the absences. It’s really important that the healthy players realize what exactly they have to do, especially after the sloppy beginning. It’s easy for me to say about it in theory, and it’s really hard to share this hardship that was created by obstacles we had to face because of the sloppy start. We were down 12, we had to find different ways and make certain adjustments and to come back. I think 20-25 in the end of first quarter was a good score for us. Olympiacos had really hot Dorsey, with all the respect to his qualities and abilities as a scorer, we’ve being giving him exactly what we were supposed not to give. In the second quarter we were really strong offensively and defensively, we created a lot of mismatches, we emptied the paint and made Fall go out and chase shooters like Jojo [Voigtmann] and Joel [Bolomboy]. Joel was an X-factor, he made great job of spreading the floor, going on boards and defending at the same time. We let our facilitators – Will, Dani, Alex, Iffe - create with more of a space and hit some spot shots. We are taking the outcome we wanted and we are growing up as a unit, as a team, it’s very important for this marathon especially in these circumstances, missing significant players.