Eurocellulari Roseto fed its hopes of reaching a berth in the ULEB Cup second round with an 85-69 home win Tuesday in Group B against Telindus Oostende of Belgium. A 48-27 second half did the trick for Roseto, which now has a 4-4 record while Oostende, at the bottom of the Group B with 1-7, is eliminated. The hometeam had as scoring leader Rodney Monroe who netted 18 points. Teemu Rannikko and Juan Manuel Moltedo contributed 15 more each, while Marko Milic scored 11. Tony Dorsey netted 17 for the guests, Virgil Stanescu scored 14, Michale Hawkins and Riimas Kaukenas added 11 and Mike Nahar dropped 10.
The game started with Eurocellulari Roseto on fire and running in the open court to take a 11-2 lead after just 2 minutes. But newcomer Michael Hawkins started to give Oostende the right tempo and also added 2 three pointers to give it a slim advantage at the ned of the first period, 22-23. In the second the game was again balanced and close, but if Roseto was nervous playing with an important goal to reach, Oostende had its mind free and kept playing calm and well. Dorsey was in an outstanding moment, as was Monroe, the only Roseto player completely in the game during this period. At the buzzer the guests led 39-42 behind Dorsey's 13 points, while Monroe had dropped 11 for Eurocellulari.
In the third period the Italian team played a tough and aggressive man-to-man defense, and Oostende had difficulty finding an easy shot and scored just 14 points. The long distance shooting percentage of Italians improved and they earned a 60-56 lead at the end of the period. In the last 10 minutes the deeper bench of Roseto gave the final push to the victory. Oostende, using always the same six players, was tired and home team found the time for spectacular plays to excite the crowd.
Tuesday, December 17, 2002
Eurocupbasketball.com