CSKA wins battle with L’Hospitalet for fifth place

U18 CSKA Moscow finished fifth at the Euroleague Basketball Adidas Next Generation Tournament Kaunas after collecting a 62-64 victory over U18 Torrons Vicens L’Hospitalet. Danila Pokhodiaev collected 17 points, 9 rebounds and 2 blocks and Filipp Gafurov had 15 points and 12 rebounds for CSKA. Mauro Abad led L’Hospitalet with 14 points and Daniil Cherneha had 12 points and 8 rebounds in the loss.

CSKA used a 0-10 run to move ahead 4-12 in the early going, and the lead was 9-20 after 10 minutes. Aleksandr Evseev extended the margin to 9-24 before Antoni Liria converted a three-point play and Unai Diaz nailed a three-pointer for L’Hospitalet. But threes from Gafurov and Pokhodiaev left CSKA ahead 17-34. L’Hospitalet then shut down the CSKA offense for the final 4:20 minutes of the first half and went on a 13-0 run to pull within 30-34 at the break. After CSKA scored the opening 2 points of the second half, Cherneha scored 4 points as L’Hospitalet put together an 11-0 spurt to pull ahead 41-36. Gafurov responded with 6 points in a 2-10 answer by CSKA to go up 43-46 and the Moscow side led 47-48 after 30 minutes. L’Hospitalet nosed ahead with Cherneha’s basket to start the fourth quarter and it led until Pokhodiaev’s free throws to make it 55-56. A Pokhodiaev three-pointer put CSKA up 55-59. Guillem Tallada followed with a three-pointer and Abad cut the gap to 62-63 with 1:53 minutes left. But L’Hospitalet could not convert the rest of the game and Vsevolod Tishin hit a free throw with 9.4 seconds left for the final score.