The Turkish team overcame a slow start to find its form at both ends in the second half against Zvezda
Better late than never for Efes
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3 Mins read
Regular Season
Round 16 of 34
Group Regular Season
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It’s fair to say that it took a while for Anadolu Efes Istanbul to find its offensive rhythm in Wednesday’s home meeting with Crvena Zvezda Meridianbet Belgrade.
The Turkish team was misfiring all over the court in the early stages, failing to convert any of its first 5 field goal attempts and committing 3 turnovers in the process. Ercan Osmani finally got Efes on the scoreboard with more than 4 minutes played, but that certainly didn’t lead to an instant improvement as Tomislav Mijatovic’s men could only score 36 points in the first half – by which time it had also committed a startling 13 turnovers.
The second half, however, was a totally different matter.
The initial spark came from Elijah Bryant, who followed consecutive baskets with a pair of free throws and a three-pointer – 9 points in the space of 3 minutes, which were enough to give Efes its first lead, 50-49. Rodrigue Beaubois then took over with 7 points early in the fourth quarter, before Dan Oturu returned off the bench to score 6 late points and seal the deal.
The final scoreline of 89-67 in no way reflected how tough the game had been for Efes. But the fact that the hosts won the rest of the game 39-18 shows just how much the Turkish team dominated the last 15 minutes and Mijatovic was delighted with the way that his players stuck to their task despite their poor start.
“It’s important to play 40 minutes,” the coach said. “Our guys understand that and credit to them. They knew that to beat a great team you’ve got to break them, break them, break them, before you actually break them. So in the fourth quarter we continued with that pressure, continued with active hands, stealing the basketball for easy unanswered points in transition.”
Bryant, who jointly led the scoring alongside Oturu with 17 points, agreed with his coach that the pressure exerted on Zvezda – which eventually led the Serbian team to commit 21 turnovers – was the decisive factor, saying: “It starts with deflections on defense. Roddy [Beaubois] helped us out a lot there. When one guy starts getting deflections it motivates the other guys. It always starts on the defensive end, and then our defense will lead to offense.”
Oturu highlighted the other side of the same coin, pointing out that Efes improved drastically from committing 13 turnovers in the first half to just 7 after the break.
“[In the second half] we were taking care of the ball and valuing possession,” he explained. “When you turn the ball over it allows the other team to get out and get easy shots, fast-break points, so taking care of the ball and trying to get good shots on offense allows us to get back and play tough defense.”
That combination of swarming defense and far more effective offense was enough for Efes to more than double the points tally of Zvezda in the second half, 53-25, and leaves Mijatovic’s men nicely poised just outside the all-important top six ahead of Friday’s visit from the other Belgrade team, Partizan.