Things were not looking good for Cazoo Baskonia Vitoria-Gasteiz in its Round 9 home showdown against Zalgiris Kaunas when the guests led 45-51 midway through the third quarter. Baskonia needed its main players to step up and Matt Costello heard the message, loud and clear, making sure his team turned things around in the final 15 minutes.
Costello sparked Baskonia's comeback
Rokas Giedraitis and Darius Thompson brought Baskonia closer and then Costello delivered with a pair of free throws, a three-pointer and a huge dunk in traffic. He singlehandedly put Baskonia back in charge, 59-54. His teammates fed off Costello's energy and Baskonia never looked back.
Vanja Marinkovic had 11 of his 14 points in the final 11 minutes. Pierria Henry and Darius Thompson provided the physicality needed to shut down Keenan Evans, who only scored 3 of his 17 points in the fourth quarter. And of course, Costello kept going, finishing the game with 19 points on 3-of-4 three-point shooting, 7 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 steal, 1 block and a game-high PIR of 25.
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"We finally played some defense in the second half and took away their drives, which really helped us," Costello said after the game. "I think we are coming together as a team, that's two games in a row. We held Monaco under 80 and in this game, we held them under 80, so hopefully, we can keep building and building, and we have a chance to do something special."