Goodbye to the group stage of the Basketball Champions League. It is not yet official, there is one match left to play at Martín Carpena, but Unicaja This Tuesday he achieved classification Round of 16. He did it with a 73-89 victory against the Filou Ostendpreceded by a victory for Mersin Sports Club over Karditsa Iaponiki (72-80) that had already confirmed the cajista leadership in Group G.
The match could have stayed there, resting from the competition until the next phase begins on January 20. However, there was much interest in an atypical Unicaja. Without Kendrick Perry, Killian Tillie or Tyson Pérez, with the official debut of Augustine Rubit and more minutes to Chase Audigeas well as an opportunity to Xavier Castanedawho had not played as green and purple since November 12.
Break-in time
What happened in Ostend had to be taken with a grain of salt because this was not a faithful representation of what the team is going to be. But there were very good details of the new ones. He American foreign He was the one who played the most: seven points, one rebound, one assist, one turnover and one recovery. Ibon Navarro already counts on him as a 'prey dog'. Rubitfresh from bronchitis, showed a good example of his intelligence with the ball. Five points. Well back.
He also had good minutes at Castañeda, always as a point guard. He had not played as a composer since November 12. He finished with 12 points, two rebounds and four assists. Nine points and eight rebounds for James Webb III13 points for Jonathan Barreirosix assists for Tyler Kalinoski…
Ibon Navarro started Castañeda and Audige on the court. Balcerowski began being the focus of the attack. At first, with success. Then, with failures caused by the lack of competitive tension. Oostende took advantage of it through Gillet to take the lead on the scoreboard (9-7). The entry of Alberto and Sulejmanovic raised the level of intensity with great defensive actions by the captain and offensive actions by the Bosnian to return the advantage (16-19).
Prominence for Castañeda
Djedovic picked up the witness, who does not understand lowering the bar. He also left a big rubit impact. This was what the game was about more than the result and the team was beginning to gain a lot of rhythm on both sides of the court with other good minutes from Audige and Castañeda. Georgios Dedas stopped him (21-31). Now it was Ibon Navarro who stopped the game after his team's step back in defense. Unicaja was stretched, although the Belgians responded at the end (34-40).
The third quarter was another movie, also starring Unicaja, but with a stellar defensive exercise. Between Alberto, Audige, Webb III and Rubit they made it 39-53. The team lost some pause with the referees, while Estrada continued doing damage with his penetrations. The Belgians were looking for a critical moment with which to do damage, but Duarte appeared to widen the difference again (56-65).
Final throttle
There was nothing left to resolve, it was not even necessary to win by classification because another result had favored. Gillet -he finished with 22 points- wanted to add some spice (63-67). Ibon Navarro turned to Alberto, Kalinoski and Balcerowski. Oostende tried to believe, but the two-time BCL champion stepped on the accelerator. came out Butayeva for the final minute (73-89). There ended the group stage for Unicaja and also for the Belgians, eliminated from the competition.
There will be one last procedure for the typesetters at Carpena, not for the Karditsa Japanikinext Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. Another meeting to distribute breaks and minutes.
