Sonny Weems
led the game in scoring and helped Zalgiris snatch the important victory by
putting up a big double-double of 18 points and 11 rebounds, while Marko
Popovic nailed a couple of clutch three-pointers to bring his points tally to
11.
The Denver
Nuggets point guard Ty Lawson marked his farewell game for the Greens with 10
points, Robertas Javtokas scored eight points, as Mindaugas Kuzminskas ended up
scoring seven in limited playing time.
Gerald Fitch had a team-high 15 points for Unicaja, also adding six rebounds and four assists to his statline, Kristaps Valters, who had six assists, and Joel Freeland, who snatched nine rebounds, both finished the game with 12 points each.
Chus Mateo (head coach of Unicaja): “We lost this game in the first half, not in the last possession. We played very soft at the beginning, made only one-of-seven threes and didn't find our shots. We talked that we have to play tougher. In the end of the game it was bad luck, because we were winning by two and played soft defence in the end.”
Aleksandr Trifunovic (head coach of Zalgiris): “Firstly, big thank you to the crowd. They did a great job for us. We wanted to keep the game in our hands, but we had been doing it for only 32 minutes. I think we still have a lot of reserves, for example, I don't remember Mantas playing in this way like he did today. Hope to see this kind of a crowd against Panathinaikos. Generally, I don't think it was a great game, but a good one for us, especially psychologically.”
When asked about Povilas Butkevicius transfer from Rudupis to Zalgiris Kaunas, the coach admitted the player will be joining the team on Thursday. “Butkevicius will join us tomorrow,” he said.
