AS Monaco Basketball suffered a disappointing 72 to 79 loss on Wednesday night against Spain’s Joventut Badalone in the Euro Cup 7 Top 16 playoffs.
When the two titans of a group go head to head, sparks are bound to fly. This was indeed the case when AS Monaco Basketball took to the court at an away game Wednesday against Joventut Badalone. Both the Monegasques and the Catalonians came out swinging and didn’t stop until the final buzzer.
The opening score was a magnificent three-pointer by Monaco and from there it is was a game of back and forth. The first quarter was all about the Red and Whites and the second was more for the opponents, mainly due to Badalone’s Macedonian powerhouse, Nedad Dimitrijevic, though Monaco did regain some points putting them within two points.
The team struggled in the third quarter, but saw some impressive shots made by Mathias Lessort JJ O’Brien and a Marcos Knight alley-oop. The deficit was felt by the lack of points scored by Captain Dee Bost, who only had two points on the entire night, a rare occurrence.
The Roca Team, whilst never too far behind, were simply unable to surpass the Catalonians. In the end, the score was 72 to 79, dropping them out of the Top 16 for the first time.
Marcos Knight was top scorer with 17 points, Rob Gray had 14 and Abdoulaye Ndoye came in with 13. The team made 26 shots out of 67 attempts and five out of 16 three-pointers.
“The Joventut deserved their victory. Badalone has a lot of size, we fought energetically to compete. They had open shots and they put them in,” said Coach Mitrovic after the match.
Roca Team has a shot at revenge when they face off against Badalone again on 2nd February on their home turf at Salle Gaston Medecin.
(By Monaco Life with AS Monaco Basketball press release, photo by AS Monaco Basketball)