The French guard produced a sterling performance for the fast-flowing Lithuanian side as the visitors took their German rivals to the cleaners
Zalgiris thumps Bayern as birthday boy Sylvain Francisco puts former club to the sword
Spielbericht
3 Lesezeit
Regular Season
Round 3 of 38
Regular Season
FC Bayern MunichBAY
7098
Zalgiris KaunasZAL
Overview
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It was quadruple joy for a single family as Sylvain Francisco celebrated his 28th birthday in grand style, earning the player of the game accolade after steering Zalgiris Kaunas to an emphatic 70-98 drubbing of his former club FC Bayern Munich in the EuroLeague.
Francisco poured in a game-high 19 points to go with 7 assists and would you believe it, it was a perfect birthday gift to his mother and aunt too, who were born on the same date as Sylvain.
It was clear from the off that the versatile guard was on song as he sank 9 points in the first quarter, all of them from long range as Zalgiris missed its opening six shots from inside but made four of five from downtown to wipe out an early 4-0 deficit, the only time the visitors were behind on the night.
Having picked injury-hit Bayern apart with fast-flowing offense coupled with ironclad defense which gave the home team preciously little room to operate, Zalgiris never looked back as it built a whopping lead to delight its vociferous band of supporters inside SAP Garden.
Francisco was at the heart of it all, as his unselfish approach unleashed a cohesive team effort which generated a staggering 14 three-pointers from 24 attempts, with Maodo Lo, another former Bayern player, adding 10 points while Dustin Sleva chipped in with 14.
At the other end, Bayern’s sharpshooter Andi Obst led Bayern on 15 points but made no real impact as the hosts played in fits and starts on offense, sorely missing a bunch of sidelined players. Particularly conspicuous for his absence and often zoomed in by the cameras was point guard Rokas Jokubaitis, who suffered a severe knee injury at FIBA EuroBasket 2025 having joined Bayern from Maccabi Rapyd Tel Aviv during the off-season.
Hauled in to pull the strings on offense, Jokubaitis could only watch helplessly as Francisco stole the show and helped Zalgiris romp to a perfect start in the current campaign with its third straight win, while Bayern dropped to 1-2.
“We knew it was going to be tough but we managed to carve out a big lead and got the win,” Francisco said in his post-game comments. “We played tough defense on Obst as we knew how lethal a shooter he is and then we just kept going as they couldn’t stop us at the other end.
“It’s that much sweeter as it’s my birthday, but also my mum’s and my aunt as we were all born on the same date,” he said with a broad and boyish smile on his face.
Zalgiris head coach Tomas Masiulis kept his feet firmly on the ground, knowing that Zalgiris may yet flatter to deceive as his team – albeit led by a different coach, Andrea Trinchieri, at the time – made an impressive 6-1 start last term before an epic meltdown denied the Lithuanian giant a postseason spot in Europe’s premier club competition.
“Every game is a new story and we just want to keep fighting,” Masiulis stressed in a flash post-game interview. “We didn’t let Bayern run, they took just 8 offensive rebounds and for them that’s not a big number. We stopped Obst as we played solid defense.”
Wearing a surgeon-styled mask on his face, Bayern head coach Gordon Herbert slammed his team for looking like a bunch of individuals who came together for the first time and not like a team which made waves last term by reaching the playoffs.
“We didn’t play as a team, we tried to play by ourselves too much,” he said. “We have four games in seven days coming up so we’ve got to look at the video of this one tomorrow and crack stuff. We lost battles at both ends of the floor and I was embarrassed how we played this game.”
Zalgiris dominated every department as it won the battle of the boards 30-25, but particularly damaging for Bayern was the difference in taking care of the ball as the visitors dished out 18 assists against 10 turnovers, while the home team had 11 assists and 13 turnovers – courtesy of relentless Zalgiris pressure.
“The stat sheet doesn’t really show how hard we hounded them defensively,” said Sleva, who constituted a wall in the paint for Zalgiris. “We did an amazing job as a team defensively as we did so many little things to stop them.”
