The big man's activity helped wear Jerusalem down
Teenager Joan Beringer set the tone for Cedevita
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Regular Season
Round 15 of 18
Group B
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Tuesday's game in Bulgaria may prove to be a watershed moment in Cedevita Olimpija Ljubljana's season as it climbed into second place in Group B with a 70-74 victory over Hapoel Bank Yahav Jerusalem. The win came with a few key stats and teenage center Joan Beringer had his hands all over them.
Cedevita dominated the paint in outrebounding Jerusalem 36-50. And it scored a whopping 19 second-chance points to just 3 for Jerusalem. The 50 rebounds were the third-most in club history and Cedevita's 16 offensive rebounds were a season high.
Beringer, who celebrated his 18th birthday just two months ago, led the charge with 5 offensive boards and 11 total rebounds, both of which marked career highs. He scored 8 points and posted a personal-best PIR of 18.
He set the tone from the very beginning with a put-back on the game’s opening possession. All told, he scored or assisted on 7 of Cedevita's second-chance points. This less than a year removed from competing at the Adidas NextGen EuroLeague tournament.
This game was tailor-made for Beringer to leave his fingerprints, and he did not disappoint. Short-handed Jerusalem suited up just 10 players and used just nine. Since both Austin Wiley and Gabi Chachashvili are out injured, Jerusalem started a frontline of 2.01-meter Justin Smith and 1.98-meter Chris Johnson, with its only natural center, Derek Ogbeide, coming off the bench. When Johnson fell into early foul trouble, that created even more problems and Beringer, who at 2.07 meters was often the tallest player on the floor, was there to take advantage.
Jerusalem head coach Yonatan Alon did not speak specifically about Beringer after the game, but he summed up his team’s weaknesses, which were exactly what the young big man exploited.
"We have won games before because of our offensive rebounding. Today we lost because of our defensive rebounding," Alon said in the post-game press conference.
"We are tired because we don’t have a full roster… We don’t have 12 players and the load is coming on the players and that is what you see at the end of the game. Good shots are not falling in, some decisions we need to make better. You don’t box out, you don’t focus enough. That is exactly the situation we are dealing with."
Beringer was, of course, one of many key figures in Cedevita’s win. Brynton Lemar scored 17 against his former team. Aleksej Nikolic made 6 free throws in the final minute to help seal the win and finished with 16 points. And, after dealing with foul trouble for much of the game, Devin Robinson scored 12 of his 15 points in the fourth quarter.
For Robinson, "defense was the key."
"We knew they were going to bring energy tonight so we had to match their energy tonight," the Cedevita forward summed up after the game.
And no player brought the energy quite like Beringer in his 19:25 minutes on the floor.