Baldwin, Horton-Tucker and De Colo all stood out against Efes
Fenerbahce guards dominate Turkish derby
Informes de partidos
3 Min lectura
Regular Season
Round 25 of 38
Regular Season
Fenerbahce Beko IstanbulFBB
7962
Anadolu Efes IstanbulEFS
Overview
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It was one of the most one-sided Turkish Derbies in EuroLeague history as Fenerbahce Beko Istanbul dominated from start to finish to beat Anadolu Efes Istanbul 79-62 at home.
Efes came to the game without four of its main guards, Shane Larkin, Rodrigue Beaubois, Jordan Loyd and Isaia Cordinier. Fenerbahce head coach Sarunas Jasikevicius made sure that running his offense through his guards was a main part of his team's game plan.
The game was balanced in the opening 6 minutes, in which both teams struggled to focus offensively. Talen Horton-Tucker thrived in this initial chaos, getting 5 quick points to give Fenerbahce a 9-5 lead before heading to the bench.
When Wade Baldwin and Nando De Colo stepped on the court, they gave Fenerbahce the discipline and ball circulation required to make the difference. They joined forces with Tarik Biberovic in a 12-0 run that saw the hosts to take off. At the end of the first quarter, Fenerbahce led 25-8. Efes kept struggling on offense, with 6 first-quarter turnovers and missing its 6 shots from beyond the arc.
Baldwin kept pacing Fenerbahce without the need of flashy individual actions, other than a circus shot late in the first half. At the break, Baldwin had 8 points, 6 assists and 0 turnovers. Efes improved in the second quarter and once Cole Swider buried a couple of three-pointers, the visitors got a bit closer, 39-25.
"I thought for a moment we were very good. I thought immediately when we came in with two ball handlers, we were excellent, and then we got the lead early and we started messing around a little bit too much," Coach Jasikevicius said after the game. "Immediately, Efes gets back into the game. And it was kind of this. So I thought we were inconsistent. I thought, like I said, both teams are going a little bit through the rough stretch. So we take the win and should be happy."
Horton-Tucker simply dominated in the second half, scoring 17 of his 22 points after the break. He had 10 in the first 4 minutes of the third quarter to singlehandedly break the game open, 52-30. Just like in the first half, Coach Jasikevicius put Baldwin and De Colo together on court and his team took full control of the game.
"We have got to keep fighting. Nobody is going to feel sorry for us if we are injured or banged up. So we have got to continue to come out and fight, just put our best foot forward and try to just play with effort every night," Horton-Tucker said after the game.
"Nando and Nico Melli, they are my vets here, so just being able to follow and stay up under them and watch what they do and do what they do in practice. I'm happy to see that it's kind of like paying off in the game. Nico's going to talk trash to me, too, so I just want to kind of shut up him up a little bit."
Fener kept excelling on defense, limiting Efes to 39 points in the first three quarters. It was its lowest score after 30 minutes since December 2017, in a 58-61 home loss against Olympiacos Piraeus.
Baldwin finished the game without any turnovers for the first time this season. He sent out 9 assists and posted a PIR of 17. De Colo had 12 points and Biberovic added 10. Saben Lee led Efes with 19 points - 17 of them in the fourth quarter.
"It's been a great month to finish it off in the Turkish Derby is phenomenal. We had a great crowd today, guys kind of digging in and find a way to win this game. It was a pretty easy one for us tonight. We'll see what happens in this double week next week," Baldwin said.
"We talked about before the game, just our span throughout the course of the last 10-13 games. We were getting a lot more scoring, but our team is producing a lot more turnovers. So cutting down on those was obviously a key for us moving forward and especially for this game. And I was able to execute a 9-assist, 0-turnover game."
Fenerbahce finished January with a 5-1 record and plays its next three games on the road, against FC Barcelona, Paris Basketball and Panathinaikos AKTOR Athens. Efes has a chance to avoid an unprecedented 10th consecutive loss in the EuroLeague when it hosts Valencia Basket on Tuesday, February 6.
