Anadolu Efes Istanbul made it a clean sweep of the double-round week by taking down Maccabi Playtika Tel Aviv 78-92 on the latter's home floor on Thursday. The victory broke their part of a four-way tie for the eighth and final playoff spot in the standings, with Efes rising to an 8-8 record and Maccabi dropping to 7-9 with its sixth consecutive defeat.
Larkin lifts Efes in Tel Aviv, 78-92
Shane Larkin shined for Efes with 26 points on 6-for-7 three-point shooting. Tibor Pleiss had 15 points while three other Efes players scored 10 each: Elijah Bryant, Krunoslav Simon and Adrien Moerman. For Maccabi, Ante Zizic poured in 23 points while James Nunnally had 14, Keenan Evans 12 and Scottie Wilbekin 10. Maccabi led 20-29 in a first half marked by several lead changes, but once Larkin got going after halftime, the hosts could not counterpunch enough to threaten Efes.
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Zizic's second-chance alley-oop dunk and a jumper by Pleiss opened the scoring before Wilbekin had Maccabi up 7-2 with the game's first triple. Pleiss continued hitting shots but Zizic and Wilbekin gave the hosts an 11-6 edge before their ex-teammate Bryant entered to convert a gutsy three-point play for Efes and Pleiss tied it with another jumper. Zizic's second alley-oop dunk was met by Moerman landing a stand-still triple for Efes's first lead, 13-14. Derrick Williams said hello with a steal and dunk for Maccabi that Bryant answered with a driving finish, just as he copied Wilbekin going off the glass to tie 18-18. Nunnally and Jalen Reynolds sparked a 7-0 Maccabi run to pull in with a 27-20 advantage after 10 minutes.
Pleiss and Reynolds exchanged inside baskets before Micic and Larkin filled a five-point possession to get Efes within 27-31. Pleiss converted a nifty and-one possession before Larkin's second triple flipped the lead and his steal-and-go fastbreak made it 34-39 for Efes. Zizic ended Maccabi's drought with a put-back to which John Di Bartolomeo added a jumper while Zizic downed free throws and a hook shot for another lead swing, 44-39. Simon rescued Efes from deep and fed Moerman for another triple to put Efes newly in front, 44-45. Wilbekin found Di Bartolomeo for triple in the corner, but Simon answered in kind, leaving Efes on top, 47-50 after 20 minutes.
Moerman and Evans traded scores to open the second half and the exchange of points continued at a fast pace until Larkin broke loose for back-to-back three-pointers to open the biggest lead of the night for Efes, 57-64. Evans broke the Efes run with a layup but Larkin was waiting again for a second-chance triple, his third in a span of 2 minutes, at 59-67. Nunnally got loose inside for a pair of baskets before Micic hit a layup and Bryant Dunston a free throw for Efes to close the third quarter leading 63-70.
Zizic fought hard for a put-back to open the fourth quarter but Bryant quieted the crowd with a three-pointer to make it 65-73. Evans struck from the arc for Maccabi while Efes got a dunk from Dunston. The scoring stalled until Evans hit again from deep to make it 71-75 with 5:30 left, but Larkin went the other way and nailed his sixth triple. Simon hit a runner out of one timeout and Larkin a baseline jumper after another to establish the game's first double-digit lead, 71-82. When Larkin hit Dunston for an easy dunk, with 2:30 left, the handwriting was on the wall that this victory was headed back to Istanbul.