Khimik Yuzhne got back to its winning ways, topping Alba Fehervar 81-52 and putting one foot in the next round on Tuesday. Win improves Khimik to 5-3 in Group F, and it will advance to the Last 32 if PAOK beats Aykon TED Ankara Kolejliler on Wednesday. Meanwhile, this loss eliminated Alba, dropping it to 1-7 in the last place. The hosts took control early on, and used a 9-0 run in the second quarter for 37-25 halftime lead. With a series of triples from Matt Gatens, Khimik pulled away to a 27-point lead late in the third quarter, and cruised to a key win. Gatens hit 5 triples on his way to 17 points, while Rolands Freimanis had 14 points plus 7 rebounds, and Paul Delaney had 14 points plus 6 rebounds. Gergely Somogyi amassed 20 points and 11 rebounds for Alba Fehervar, while Bryadon Hobbs finished with 11 in defeat.
Romeo Travis and Delaney got Khimik's offense going, while Ramone Moore paced Alba with 7 points to a 13-13 tie early on. With a layup and a three-pointer from Freimanis, and with Gatens hitting a triple of his own, the hosts took 23-16 lead after 10 minutes. Both teams struggled to score at the start of the second quarter, before Travis scored on a fastbreak, and Vitaliy Kovalenko and Gatens nailed a three-pointer apiece for 34-20. After Somogyi snapped a 9-0 run with a put-back, Travis and Maurice Kemp traded triples for 37-25 at halftime. After the break, Khimik started to put the game out of reach. Delaney strung together 7 points, with a put-back and with a pair of steals that led to dunks and 47-29. Hobbs hit a triple, and a layup from Somogyi kept alive hope for the visitors, but Gatens nailed back-to-back threes, and after a layup from Travis, Gatens added another one from long range, followed by a triple from Freimanis and 63-36 late in the third quarter. While Kemp and Somogyi scored baskets for the visitors in the fourth quarter, triples from Oleksandr Riabchuk and Oleksandr Prokopenko extended it to 71-42, and couple of layups from Kovalenko and one from Freimanis helped make it the largest margin of the night, 81-46, before Hobbs and Somogyi rounded out the scoring in the final minute.
Tuesday, December 3, 2013
Eurocupbasketball.com