2021-22Regular SeasonRound 1
October 20, 2021 CET: 20:00
Local time: 20:00 EKINOX

Reyer holds off Bourg for opening road win

Umana Reyer Venice opened the 7DAYS EuroCup season with its first-ever opening-round road win, downing Mincidelice JL Bourg en Bresse 62-73 on Wednesday night in Group B. Reyer took the lead for good early in the first quarter and led by double figures for the majority of the night. Reyer opened its first double-digit lead in the second quarter and made it a 16-point game in the third before holding off Bourg's fourth-quarter comeback attempt. Mitchell Watt starred with 16 points and 12 rebounds for the winners. Stefano Tonut scored 14 with 5 assists, Austin Daye netted 13 and Valerio Mazzola 10 points for Reyer. Rasheed Sulaimon paced Bourg scorers with 11 points and Pierre Pelos scored 10 in a losing effort.

Reyer went inside early after back-to-back threes from Tarik Phillip and Valerio Mazzola. Watt followed with a basket inside before a transition triple from Julyan Stone capped a 2-13 run. Maxime Roos hit a corner triple for the hosts, but a three-point play from Vitali extended it to 9-18. However, Pierre Pelos hit from the outside and Hugo Benitez made a layup that got Bourg within 14-18 after 10 minutes.

Reyer was held without a basket for more than 4 minutes between the first and second quarters before layups from Jeff Brooks and Austin Daye in a 0-6 run helped open the first double-digit margin of the night. Bourg was held to a single point for more than 5 minutes to open the second quarter, as Stefano Tonut's fastbreak layup extended the difference to 15-26. Alexandre Chassang's triple ended Bourg's drought of nearly 7 minutes without a field goal before Tonut and Hayden Dalton traded triples. Baskets were few and far between the rest of the first half, but Mazzola nailed another triple to help send Reyer into halftime up 26-34.

Phillip and Mazzola nailed back-to-back threes to open the third quarter. Pelos scored twice inside and Rasheed Sulaimon hit a jumper, but Watt and Tonut combined to score 8 points and extend the margin to 32-48 midway through the third. Roos had an explosive put-back dunk and Bourg cut it into single digits behind Sulaimon who hit a triple and a long jumper, cutting it to 41-50. Benitez added a three-point play to Bourg's tally, but Austin Day hit a tough corner triple to make it 44-55 after three quarters.

Daye knocked down another one from the same spot in the opening minute of the fourth, but Dalton had a triple and Mika scored 5 points, including a three-point play that kept Bourg in striking distance, 52-60. Mika's dunk made it 56-62, but that was as close as Bourg got despite keeping Reyer without a field goal for nearly 5 minutes. Daye got a shooter's roll on a three-pointer with 2:10 left in the game to get the margin back to double figures, 56-66. The visitors sealed the deal when Tonut also got a favorable bounce for a three-pointer, making it 58-69 entering the final minute.

Telling numbers: Reyer shoots better and makes fewer TOs

Offensively, Umana Reyer Venice nailed 11 of 26 (42.3%) three-pointers, compared to Mincidelice JL Bourg en Bresse's 6-for-21 (28.6%) three-point shooting. Reyer finished with 22 assists, compared to just 15 for Bourg while the visitors also had a significant advantage in a turnover margin, committing just 10 to the hosts' 16 for the night.

The biggest statistical win for Reyer, however, might be its 6 second-chance points to Bourg's only 5. It might look quite insignificant, but not when knowing that Bourg had 15 offensive rebounds, which is more than twice the number of offensive boards that Reyer had. Still, despite a major rebounding disadvantage, the visitors did not suffer.

Daye emerges from foul trouble to be Reyer's key performer

One of Reyer's key players, power forward Austin Daye, was not only quiet for the first two and a half quarters, but he barely played. Due two a pair of personal fouls, Daye only spent 2 minutes and 45 seconds on the floor in the first half and did not enter the game again until the halfway mark of the third quarter. But he quickly caught fire, first scoring a basket inside, then hitting a triple to end the third, and also knocking one down in the opening minute of the fourth quarter. Daye ended up being on the floor for 12 of the final 15 minutes of the game and scoring 11 of his 13 points in that span, finishing the game 2-of-3 on two-point shooting and 3-of-4 from long range.

Reyer's defense on display

Mincidelice JL Bourg en Bresse had 9 offensive rebounds in the first half, but that did not help it much because Reyer held the hosts to 4-for-21 two-point shooting in the first two quarters. Reyer's defense was especially efficient in the second quarter when Bourg did not score a single two-point shot on 6 attempts while making 2-of-5 from three-point range.

Bourg finished with a 42-30 rebounding edge, including 15-7 on the offensive glass, and Bourg did make 14 two-point shots in the second half. However, the hosts made only 2 of 10 three-point shots after the break. Reyer's defense simply never allowed the hosts to find a balanced offensive effort and never allowed them to cut the margin closer than 6 points.

Stefano Tonut - Umana Reyer Venice (photo Jacques Cormareche - Bourg) - EC21
Wednesday, October 20, 2021
Eurocupbasketball.com
Referees: KOROMILAS, ELIAS; KARDUM, LUKA; PEER, ADAR
Attendance: 1889
By Quarter1234
Mincidelice JL Bourg en Bresse14121818
Umana Reyer Venice18162118
End of Quarter1234
Mincidelice JL Bourg en Bresse14264462
Umana Reyer Venice18345573
Mincidelice JL Bourg en Bresse
  Rebounds Blocks Fouls
# Player Min Pts 2FG 3FG FT O D T As St To Fv Ag Cm Rv PIR
1 SULAIMON, RASHEED 37:31 11 4/10 1/7     5 5 2       1 3 3 5
2 CHASSANG, ALEXANDRE 19:37 7 1/2 1/1 2/2 2 6 8 2   2     2 1 13
5 BENITEZ, HUGO 24:01 6 2/4 0/1 2/3 3   3 2 1 3   1 1 7 10
9 COSSE, HUGO DNP - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
12 MIKA, ERIC 16:43 8 3/6   2/3 1 3 4 1 1 2     1 4 11
13 PELOS, PIERRE 13:32 10 3/6 1/2 1/2 3 2 5 1 1 1     1 2 12
20 DALTON, HAYDEN 19:48 8 1/3 2/5   1 3 4             1 8
22 WILLIAMS, JACOREY 11:46 2 1/4     1 5 6     3     2    
23 ROOS, MAXIME 24:28 5 1/2 1/2   3   3   1 1     4   2
73 FALCOZ, CORENTIN DNP - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
83 JULIEN, AXEL 32:34 5 2/6 0/3 1/2   3 3 7   4 1   2 3 5
Team           1   1               1
Totals 200:00 62 18/43 6/21 8/12 15 27 42 15 4 16 1 2 16 21 67
        41.9% 28.6% 66.7%
Head coach: LEGNAME, LAURENT
Min: Minutes played; Pts: Points; 2FG M-A: 2-point Field Goals (Made-Attempted); 3FG M-A: 3-point Field Goals (Made-Attempted); FT M-A: Free Throws (Made-Attempted); Rebounds: O (Offensive), D (Defensive), T (Total); As: Assists; St: Steals; To: Turnovers; Bl: Blocks (Fv: In Favor / Ag: Against); Fouls: Cm (Commited), Rv (Received); PIR: Performance Index Rating
Umana Reyer Venice
  Rebounds Blocks Fouls
# Player Min Pts 2FG 3FG FT O D T As St To Fv Ag Cm Rv PIR
5 STONE, JULYAN 10:04 3 0/1 1/3     3 3 1     1       5
7 TONUT, STEFANO 30:17 14 2/4 2/5 4/4       5 1         4 19
9 DAYE, AUSTIN 14:42 13 2/3 3/4     2 2     1     2 1 11
10 DE NICOLAO, ANDREA 16:25     0/2         2 1       3 2  
11 SANDERS, VICTOR 14:51 6 2/3 0/1 2/2   1 1 2   4 1   2 1 3
12 PHILLIP, TARIK 23:35 6 0/3 2/3     1 1 4 1 1     3   4
15 CHARALAMPOPOULOS, VASILIS 4:57       0/2                 1 1 -2
22 MAZZOLA, VALERIO 20:36 10 0/2 3/4 1/2 1 2 3 2         1 2 12
23 BROOKS, JEFF 12:33 2 1/3     2 1 3 2 1 2     3   1
30 CERELLA, BRUNO DNP - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
31 VITALI, MICHELE 19:51 3 1/2 0/4 1/1   4 4 3 1       3 2 5
50 WATT, MITCHELL 32:09 16 6/12   4/4 4 8 12 1 2 2   1 3 3 22
Team             1 1               1
Totals 200:00 73 14/33 11/26 12/15 7 23 30 22 7 10 2 1 21 16 81
        42.4% 42.3% 80%
Head coach: DE RAFFAELE, WALTER

Head Coaches

LEGNAME, LAURENT
Mincidelice JL Bourg en Bresse
"It is simple. When you miss all the easy shots, layups, you cannot win. In the first half, it was happening. We had good situations for scoring, but we missed everything. We also missed free throws. Our defense was not really bad, we allowed 34 points in the first half, but we scored only 26. We did not score during a 7-minute period, that is not enough to win. In the beginning, some players were not concerned by fight, aggressiveness, by defense. The second half was a little better, some players tried to react but it is too difficult if only two or three players are concerned by the game. We were playing against a better team, just that."
DE RAFFAELE, WALTER
Umana Reyer Venice

"It was the first game in the new EuroCup, so it was a little emotional for everybody. We played really solid on defense all game long. Also, in the last 4 or 5 minutes when Bourg tried to come back into the game and we struggled on offense, we played hard on defense. That is absolutely a key to win on the road, which is always difficult and not easy. I am happy with my players because they were focused on our rules and our goal for this game. It was really important coming off two bad games in the Italian League. We knew how Bourg likes to run the floor, has talented players like Julien, and we did a very good job on him. My congratulations to the fans. It is a very good crowd, but very sportsmanlike, I appreciate it a lot. Players like to play in these situations.

"Our goal is to find our identity as soon as possible, we lose and find it every game. This season in the EuroCup, both groups are tough. We want to compete as much as possible with everybody. We don't have great, exceptional goals, just to compete, and then if we are lucky, we can keep going through. But we have to show we play as a team, that is the most important thing to be able to compete."

Players

DALTON, HAYDEN
Mincidelice JL Bourg en Bresse
"Honestly it wasn’t the way that we wanted to start the EuroCup. There are some things that we need to work on as a team and we didn’t show what we are really capable of. We didn’t score that much during the first half and it’s a bit disappointing."
MIKA, ERIC
Mincidelice JL Bourg en Bresse
"Defensively, still a couple of things to work on. Obviously, we faced a talented team on offense. We also missed some open shots, we were around 60% during the first half, so it means that we missed open shots, layups and free-throws."
DAYE, AUSTIN
Umana Reyer Venice
"I think that we had a good defense tonight, we did a good job, the point guards organized well the game and made plays for everybody. Especially on the pick and rolls."
WATT, MITCHELL
Umana Reyer Venice
"The first half was a defensive battle. I think we came out and set a tone early. But they are a great team, and in the second half, they bounced back. But I am just proud of the guys for holding strong, coming together and getting a win. We lost some games lately, but we got a lot of fight in this locker room, and I knew we were going to respond tonight."