ALBA Berlin had a tough time in the first half of its game against LDLC ASVEL Villeurbanne at Astroballe on Friday night. The home team was dominating 44-32 late in the second period, having taken advantage of accurate shooting from behind the arc. At that point, ASVEL had hit 8 triples from only 12 attempts.
But ALBA maintained faith in what it was doing. Particularly on defense, it used different zone configurations to affect the rhythm of ASVEL's shooters. It worked to perfection, as ASVEL's players began to miss shots that they had scored before.
The home team finished with a not-so-bad 11-of-31 (35% 3FG) from downtown. However, when just looking at the last 24 minutes of the game, the figures are not so impressive, as only Amine Noua and Nando De Colo were able to score a three-pointer. Overall, the home team went 2-of-19 (10.5% 3FG) in that span, which helped ALBA take control of the game for good.
Taking into account that many of those missed shots ended up in ALBA’s hands, with the visitors outrebounding ASVEL 30-42, it’s not difficult to see how the visitors managed to bring their 12-game losing streak to an end.