Down 7 in the third quarter, the home team clamped down and turned the game around
Bayern leaned on rebounding, defense to drop Milan
Отчеты о матчах
3 Минутное чтение
Regular Season
Round 4 of 38
Regular Season
FC Bayern MunichBAY
6453
EA7 Emporio Armani MilanEA7
Overview
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"Not the most beautiful game to watch, you know, but I would choose an ugly game and win it," FC Bayern Munich forward Vladimir Lucic confessed after his team escaped with a 64-53 victory over EA7 Emporio Armani Milan on Tuesday night.
Very few could dispute Lucic’s words after watching a game in which neither team shot over 50% on two-pointers nor 25% from beyond the arc.
But in that low-scoring, low-efficiency, and highly defensive setting, Bayern managed to grow throughout the game thanks to steady work – not particularly flashy, but extremely effective.
At halftime, the hosts were trailing 28-33, having given up 11 rebounds on their own rim and allowed 9 second-chance points. A basket by Leandro Bolmaro shortly after the break gave Milan its largest lead, 28-35, turning on the red lights for a German side that had suffered a heavy and painful loss against Zalgiris in its last home game.
However, as Gordon Herbert pointed out at halftime, his team’s defense was not bad, although turnovers and weakness on the defensive boards prevented them from taking control of the game. Additionally, Shavon Shields and, especially, Devin Booker had been a nightmare up to that point, scoring 9 points apiece and using their physicality to dominate their defenders.
Bayern’s greatest virtue was not hanging their heads, using rotations to keep a high physical level, and improving their rebounding performance. In the second half, the home team only conceded 3 offensive rebounds, committed just 3 turnovers, and held Shields and Booker to a combined total of only 3 points.
"I’m really proud of the guys," Coach Herbert said. "We were down by 6 or 7 in the third quarter, and I think the guys showed resilience and really stuck it in there defensively. Then we got, you know, our offense kind of got going a little bit more. In the second half we cleaned up our defense and rebounding, and for me, that was the biggest takeaway."
He also acknowledged during the press conference that being able to effectively use 11 players despite the injuries - Stefan Jovic, Johannes Voigtmann, Elias Harris and Rokas Jokubaitis were sidelined - was one of the keys to explaining the victory.
"I would also like to talk about Leon Kratzer, for example," he detailed. "He didn't play for the first 25 minutes, but came in and had an outstanding performance. In 4 minutes for us he had plus 9... Guys came off the bench, ready to play, which was huge… We can play 10 sometimes, 11, just the way the game goes sometimes."
Thanks to holding Milan to a slow offensive output, Bayern only had to wait for a brief burst of accuracy from beyond the arc to take control of the game. Two three-pointers, one from Andreas Obst and another from Kamar Baldwin – half of all the home team's triples in the entire game – during a short three-minute span sparked a 14-2 run that put Bayern ahead, 42-37, midway through the third quarter.
From that point on, Milan gradually felt more and more suffocated, losing confidence as even open shots failed to go in, and with its two key players, Shields and Booker, unable to find any support. In his press conference, Messina even described his team's offense from then on as “disorganized”.
So, Bayern were able to run, score on the fast break, and seal the victory with relative ease thanks to Lucic’s free throws and a final three-pointer from Obst in the last minute.
"In the second half, we secured the rebounds, we could run. We could play our offense, had more flow, more rhythm, and I think there was a key today. It was not the nicest game, but I think it was really working on defense, getting rebounds and playing tough and physical," Obst summarized.
