Tiktekno: clip summarizing today's events in sports, 8.2/Sport1
1.
Just two weeks ago in Maccabi Tel Aviv, they looked at the rivals for the place in the playoffs with the whites of their eyes.
After the victory over Panathinaikos, the yellows were in the top six and with the feeling that a difficult season can be ended with an impressive achievement.
Two weeks later, the dream was dashed.
Last night (Thursday) the Yellows lost 105:91 to Anadolu Efes in Riga, dropping to 13:13, and the gap between them and a place outside the play-in was completely erased.
Eight rounds to the end of the season, the Yellows' margin of error has disappeared.
Last night's game in Riga, to which Maccabi showed up again without Lorenzo Brown, who had a back injury, started well for the Yellows, who received an excellent offensive first half from a group of players, including Bonzie Coulson and Wade Baldwin, and went into halftime with a 50:51 lead.
Maccabi stayed in the game until the end of the third quarter, which it closed with only two points behind, but at the beginning of the fourth quarter, Anadolu started to run away, the shooting percentages of the yellows dropped, and Maccabi got stuck on only 16 points in the quarter on the way to a loss.
Eps scored 60 percent for 2 points, 42 percent for 3 points, handed out 20 assists and lost only 3 balls!
Maccabi got a good night offensively from Wade Baldwin with 26 points and 5 assists, with five other players scoring in double figures, including Antonios Cleveland in his best game at the club with 12 points, but didn't get too much from Bonzie Colson in the second half, and suffered a bad day from Roman Sorkin and James Webb, as well as Tamir Blatt's weak shooting ability from outside the arc despite 9 assists.
"A tough loss against a very strong opponent," said Josh Niebo who scored 12 points and added 7 rebounds, "our defense was not at the level we needed it to be tonight to give us a chance to win. We gave up too many offensive rebounds and free threes, we need to be better In performing team drills and executing the defensive game plan. We will have to move on and prepare for the big game we have in the league on Sunday."
Without saving, you can't win.
Larkin vs. DiBartholomeo Vanivo/Official website, Anadolu Efes
2.
The amazing figure regarding Maccabi Tel Aviv concerns the ability, or the ability to be more precise, on the defensive side.
Last night's game was the sixth this season in which the Yellows scored over 100 points, the most in the Euroleague, and the 13th in which they scored 90 points or more.
After 26 rounds, the Yellows receive an average of 88.07 points per game, the most in the Euroleague, and by quite a large margin from the second, Villervan, which receives 3 points less on average.
Since the EuroLeague switched to the league format in 2016/17 only one team, Khimki Moscow in the 2020/21 season, has conceded more on average, with 89.7 points per game.
That Khimki finished in last place in the Euroleague with only 4 wins and suffered from serious problems throughout the season.
"There's no doubt, our defense is horrible," admitted one of the club's members last night, "We knew coming into the game that it would be very difficult for us to beat Anadolu without picking up the defense and stopping them from under 90 points. It's very rare to win games in a shooting contest against a team Such quality. We have to save a little, and we haven't been doing that in recent weeks."
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Baldwin last night/Official website, Anadolu Efes
3.
Last night's loss not only kept Maccabi away from the dream of the playoffs, which now seems unrealistic with Baskonia's escape to a game and a half away, and also against the background of Olympiakos' withdrawal, but also brought Partizan and Anadolu very close to the Yellows.
Eight rounds to the end of the season await the Yellows after the break a series of more comfortable games.
Out of the next five rounds in the factory, the only team that is still somehow in the play-in battles is Red Star Belgrade, with all the others out of the picture.
Maccabi will close the season with a home game against Valencia, an away game in Barcelona and a home game against Milan, which last night also regained the chance for the play-in with the great victory over Real Madrid.
Oded Ketch's team now has a three-week break to try to finish the season as they did the last two years, when in the last weeks of the season they accumulated a winning streak and entered the playoffs.
Currently, it is quite clear that the team will need at least five wins in eight games to enter the play-in, a task not impossible in light of the game schedule, but not easy in light of the ability.
The goal: at least five photo-finish victories.
Ketch/Audi Citiat
4.
The one who didn't get on the floor in Riga last night was Lorenzo Brown.
The yellow guard, who played in the last two weeks after returning from a back injury and looked limited and ineffective, did not train in the last few days after the game against Hapoel Holon.
Maccabi hoped that he would feel better before last night's game, but already in the morning the team realized that the chances of him playing were zero.
The only question that remains open for Maccabi is whether to disable Brown and give him a rest until the return of the Euroleague or try and participate in one of the two big games they have left in the league until the national team break - the derby this coming Sunday, and the Hapoel Jerusalem away on Friday.
Currently, the tendency of the Yellows is not to risk Brown so that he can contribute in the last part of the season in the Euroleague, when the one who may be thrown into the water in one of these games is Joe Thomason who signed with the team yesterday.
Will he miss both the derby and Jerusalem?
Lorenzo Brown/Audi Citiat
5.
Today in the late afternoon, Maccabi will return to Israel after the trip to Riga, while tomorrow they will return to the floor for a final training ahead of the Tel Aviv derby that will be held on Sunday.
The upcoming derby is critical for the Yellows who want to make up for the loss from a few weeks ago, as well as stick to the top of the table and not continue to languish on the edge of the top.
Despite the bad season, losses in the derby and also to Hapoel Jerusalem afterwards should not cause shocks in the system, but Maccabi want to believe that they will come out of the exhausting week in the Premier League, in which they will play four games in eight days, when they are in second place in the table.
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