U18 Virtus Bologna opened its Euroleague Basketball ADIDIAS NEXT GENERATION TOURNAMENT Qualifying Tournament – Torneo Citta di Roma with an 81-49 victory over U18 Anadolu Efes Istanbul on Sunday. Michele Rubbini led the way in the Group A encounter with 18 points as Bologna clinched its first ANGT win since the first game of the 2012-13 ANGT Rome tournament – snapping a string of seven losses. Danilo Petrovic added 12 points for the winners and Isacco Lovisotto chipped in 11 points. Anadolu Efes lost the game despite Ismet Avsar tallying 16 points while Burak Nurkan added 11 points in the defeat. Anadolu Efes turned the ball over 21 times and made just 3-of-28 three-pointers.

Alessandro Pajola opened the scoring for Virtus with two free throws and Petrovic made it 4-0 before Hakan Emiroglu scored Anadolu Efes’ first points. Petrovic and Mirko Carella pushed the lead to 8-2 and then Lorenz Penna’s three-pointer and another Petrovic score had Virtus ahead 15-7. Tolga Birer answered and Arda Erdogan’s free throw trimmed the gap to 15-10. But Lovisotto and Michele Ebeling both converted two free throws to increase the margin to 19-10. Ebeling’s first basket gave Virtus its first double-digit lead at 21-11 and Jacopo Gianninoni nailed a three-pointer at the end of the first quarter as the advantage grew to24-13 after 10 minutes. After Nurkan started the second quarter scoring, Nicolo Dellosto hit Virtus’ first basket. Nurkan followed that with a three-point play and Avsar added four straight points to pull Anadolu Efes to within 26-22. Carella snapped a three-minute scoreless stretch and Petrovic added another score to push the lead to 29-22. Avsar continued his strong game with two more baskets and Samet Gulek cut the deficit to 31-28. Rubbini punched right back with a three-pointer, and Lovisotto followed Pajola’s two free throws with a three-pointer just before the half time buzzer as Virtus was ahead 39-28 at intermission.

Pajolo’s free throw got the scoring going in the second half and was followed by an Avsar basket to make it 40-30. But Petrovic set up a Pajola basket and put back an offensive rebound as the advantage grew to 44-30. Erdogan came up with a three-point play but Rubbini was on target again from long range and two Carella free throws made it 50-33 midway through the third quarter. Carella added two more foul shots before a Tommaso Rossi three-ball had the gap at 20 points – 55-35. Emiroglu came back with a three-point play and Anadolu Efes kept Virtus scoreless the rest of the quarter with Nurkan’s three-pointer getting the deficit down to 55-41 after 30 minutes. Nicolo Dellosto started the fourth quarter with a three-pointer for the Italian club and Rubbini followed that with a fast break layup and a three-pointer to push the margin back to 63-41. Nurkan’s three-pointer finally got Anadolu Efes on the board almost four minutes into the fourth quarter before Virtus scored the next six points for a 69-44 lead. Yigitcan Saybir was able to knock down a three-ball but Virtus continued to run away in the final quarter with Rubbini scoring seven straight points as the cushion swelled to 76-47 and put the game out of reach for good.