Despite trailing for the majority of the contest, Strasbourg fought back to pip Galatasaray 66-62 in the first leg of their Eurocup final in the north-east of France.
In defeat though, Galatasaray will fancy their chances as the tie now moves to Istanbul on Wednesday.
Louis Campbell paced the winners with 16 points, eight rebounds and six assists as Strasbourg enjoyed an eight-point lead late on only to slip in the game’s closing stages as Galatasaray scored the final four points to leave the game nicely poised.
“It will take poise and concentration to defend this lead in Istanbul,” Campbell said.
“Hopefully we can play the same defense over there and hit some more shots. If we do that, we will definitely give ourselves a chance.”
Matt Howard and Jeremy Leloup both added 11 for Strasbourg.
“We will go there with the same spirit we showed tonight,” Strasbourg coach Vincent Collet commented.
“We have to play smarter, longer. Too many minutes we did not play the right way against their defence we need to do some adjustment, we must find a better offence obviously if we want to have a chance in Istanbul.”
Vladimir Micov led Galatasaray with 17 points, Blake Schilb posted 12 points and 8 rebounds and Chuck Davis came off the bench for 11 points, including the basket that sent him into second place on the Eurocup’s career scoring charts with 1,141.
