Dreamland Gran Canaria shrugged off a poor run of form by comfortably overcoming Slask Wroclaw, 68-92, on Wednesday night, and it was a very impressive all-round team display from the reigning champion.
Team effort led Gran Canaria to convincing win



When Jovan Kljajic opened the second half scoring with a three-point strike, it meant that all 12 Gran Canaria players had already got themselves on the scoreboard. And nobody was greedy about it: no Granca player reached double digits until AJ Slaughter netted consecutive close-range scores midway through the third quarter, by which time the lead was already 43-62.
And that kind of collective approach was reflected in many of the night’s stats. By the end of the game, 11 different Gran Canaria players had scored at least 2 field goals – only Andrew Albicy, who led the team with 5 assists, was held to just one field goal. In total, 10 players dished assists, totaling 29 across the team, 11 grabbed at least 1 rebound, and seven different players claimed steals.
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Coach Jaka Lakovic was able to take advantage of the remarkable effectiveness throughout his roster by spreading the playing time extremely evenly across his players, with nobody spending more time on the court than 23:41 (Sylven Landesberg) or less than 12:49 (John Shurna).
That all added up to allow Gran Canaria to put 92 points on the board even though no individual player scored more than 12 (Ben Lammers), sending a strong message to the rest of the BKT EuroCup that this roster runs deeper than perhaps any other.
Lakavic was still not satisfied, though, knowing that his team has a lot more work lying ahead to achieve its aim of defending the crown. “We played a solid game but we made some mistakes that we have to analyze,” he said. "We have to get better and play with more intensity.”
But if his players maintain the same team-first ethic they showed on Wednesday night, the future looks bright.