Marcus Foster and Jonathan Motley combined for 53 points and a PIR of 59
Hapoel’s Foster-Motley duo was too much for Buducnost
Hapoel Shlomo Tel Aviv had a bad taste in its mouth when it trailed 17-22 at the end of the first quarter in the game against visiting Buducnost VOLI Podgorica. Despite Jonathan Motley and Marcus Foster running the show in the early going, Buducnost took advantage of their absence in the last minutes of the first period to build that lead.
Because on Wednesday night, everything was different for Hapoel with and without Motley and Foster on the court. At the beginning of the game, Foster and Motley had combined for 12 of their team’s first 14 points for a slim disadvantage, 14-15. When they sat down, Buducnost escaped.
“We played a good first quarter”, Buducnost head coach Andrej Zakelj regretted in the press conference. “Then we stopped to play defense, especially in one-on-one situations… without any fight, energy, and you cannot expect to win against this good team with this kind of game.”
Zakelj’s words were surely influenced by the astonishing performances of Motley and Foster, who led Hapoel’s awakening in the second quarter, break away in the third and the outcome confirmation that came late in the fourth.
Motley scored 9 of his team’s last 11 points right before halftime good to reach the intermission with a 46-38 Hapoel lead. Motley had scored 16 points already.
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Later, when the game resumed after the break, Foster decided to take over and put up an impressive shooting performance, scoring 16 of Hapoel’s first 18 points in the quarter. He drilled 4 three-pointers and made two buckets without missing a shot in that time span, helping his team raise the difference to 74-55 after 30 minutes.
And finally, when Buducnost tried to get back into the game, 78-65, early in the last quarter, Motley reappeared to put the game to bed. He took the court with 6:26 remaining and scored the next 12 Hapoel points over the next 5 minutes, which definitely broke Buducnost’s defenses.
Overall, Foster finished with 23 points and 20 PIR, both his best marks in the competition, as Motley finished with 30 points, 7 rebounds and 4 assists to tie his career-high PIR of 39.
“I see a lot of double teams and traps last game,” Motley reminded after the game. “I didn't play so well in the last game, they were trapping and I was forcing a lot of shots. So, I just wanted to come out here tonight and be more aggressive on the pass. So, you know, when you pass, it loosens up the defense then I can score. So that's kind of what I tried to do tonight.”
And he did so quite well.