


AS Monaco got back to winning ways on Friday night with a victory in the French Derby, defeating the visiting LDLC ASVEL Villeurbanne 87-75 at Salle Gaston Medecin. Monaco led for almost the entire night, but it needed a strong fourth quarter to secure the win, which saw it sweep ASVEL to improve to a 15-9 record and move into fourth place in the standing. ASVEL, who was without Nando De Colo, suffered its third straight defeat and dropped to 8-16 on the season.
Jordan Loyd led six double-digit Monaco players with 16 points, while Alpha Diallo had 12 points, 5 assists and 4 rebounds. Donatas Motiejunas also scored 12, Mike James had 10 points and 7 assists, and Donta Hall and Elie Okobo also scored 10 apiece in the win. Retin Obasohan was ASVEL's top scorer with 11 points. Amine Noua had 10 points and 7 rebounds, and Alex Tyus paired 10 points with 6 rebounds.
Monaco took control right away thanks to back-to-back dunks from Diallo. A jumper and a triple from James opened a 17-9 margin. A three from John Brown helped make it 25-13, but two threes from Antoine Diot, including a half-court buzzer-beater, cut it to 28-21 after 10 minutes. Yakuba Ouattara and Loyd hit back-to-back threes to open the second quarter, before another basket from Loyd made it 36-22. ASVEL got its offense going with Obasohan and Youssoupha Fall, but Motiejunas kept the margin at double figures. The teams traded blows the rest of the half, yet Monaco took a 50-40 advantage into the break.
Dee Bost and Noua each had a three-pointer early in the third quarter, but Loyd hit from downtown for Monaco as the margin remained between 10 and 13 points until Diot's three-pointer made it 65-57. ASVEL went on to score the final 6 points of the quarter, capped with a pair of runners from Obasohan that cut it to 67-63. But, that's as close as the visitors got as Monaco opened the fourth quarter with an 8-1 run, not allowing a single field goal for more than three and a half minutes. Noua nailed a triple and Youssoupha Fall had a putback layup, but a triple from Elie Okobo with 2:04 to go made it 83-70, icing the game.