Real Madrid continues to put its poor season start in its review mirror as it fended off Spanish rival Valencia Basket on the road for a fourth straight win. Real nearly wasted a 16-point lead, but beat Valencia 73-80 for its fifth victory in the last six games. Los Blancos improved to 6-3 on the season after a 1-2 start.
Real fends off Valencia, 73-80, extends win streak to four games
Dzanan Musa tallied a career-high 28 points while Gabriel Deck posted up a double-double of 16 points and 10 rebounds and Edy Tavares chipped in 4 points, 6 rebounds and 6 assists. Valencia fell to 4-5 despite Sam van Rossom scoring 17 points and Bojan Dubljevic adding 15 points.
Game Videos
Tavares was doing it all early on with scoring, offensive rebounds and assists in helping Real open a double-digit lead, 11-22. The guests kept their foot on the gas and led 19-31 after 10 minutes. The cushion grew to as many as 16 points thanks to some excellent play from Musa to lead 21-37. Valencia managed a 9-2 spurt to get within 8 points and trailed 31-41 at the break.
Two Dubljevic triples had Valencia down just 40-48 but Musa continued to be masterful and Real went into the last quarter up 46-59. Valencia would not go away and a Van Rossom three-pointer cut the deficit to 71-74 with a minute left. Deck and Musa answered at the other end though to lock up the win.