Unicaja Malaga won a hard game (93-88) against Turkish team Efes Pilsen, which managed to reduce a 17 points disadvantage in the third quarter to finally loose the game in the overtime. In the local side, Cook and Freeland player a great game, while Thornton and Peker were the best men in Efes.
Unicaja Malaga continues with this strange beginning of season. In their national league, they have lost all five games, giving a poor impression most of the times. But when they hear “Devotion” hymn, they suddenly became strong player to beat anybody.
And that’s what happened in Malaga once again. Unicaja started the game very hard, with a full-court pressure, just to make notice Efes Pilsen that it was not going to be a difficult visit. So little by little, the local team started to get little advantages, all this way until the end of the first half.
The second half was a strange one. Unicaja started very motivated, trying to win the game with 15 minutes left. And they almost got it. Up to 17 points in advantage they managed to get in the third quarter (59-42, min. 26). But then something weird happened. Ergin Ataman ordered a 2-3 zonal defense, and that was the end of the happy time for Aito’s team. 7 minutes without any basket, only four free-throws scored by Unicaja made everybody think that it was a losing effort.
The last quarter started all the same. Unicaja with big problems to score, and Efes trying to run the court. It seems pretty clear that Pooh Jeter is not a point guard for this team. He’s completely lost and moreover he doesn’t make anything more that shooting, and he makes it bad. So it has to be Cook again, associated with Freeland who tried to give the win to Unicaja. Although Efes even got 2 points in advantage, the local team tied the game, and Pooh Jeter even got the shoot to win. But he missed.
In the overtime, Unicaja was more confident. Berni Rodriguez stole a crucial ball and Taquan Dean scored a definitive three-pointer to give Aito anothe european win that makes-up the local disaster in ACB league.
Efes Pilsen played great on defense, specially with that killing zonal defense, but they have to do thing much better on offese. Rakocevic, in his return to Malaga, disappeared trough the game and so Kasun did with his problems with personal fouls. It’s sure that Ataman will need more than four written pages to solve this problem with the croatian starting center.
