Without its three main ballhandlers, Fenerbahce found answers from its healthy guards
Fenerbahce turns problem into opportunity
Article
3 Mins read
Regular Season
Round 19 of 34
Group Regular Season
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Fenerbahce Beko Istanbul opened 2025 with a statement victory, downing Anadolu Efes Istanbul 84-76 at Ulker Sports and Event Hall. Despite several backcourt absences and a three-game losing streak with some ugly performances, Fenerbahce did not let its fans down in this derby. In fact, Coach Sarunas Jasikevicius's team played one of its best defensive games of the season.
Efes was limited to 36 second-half points. After the break, the visiting team made just 2 of 12 shots from beyond the arc and dished just 3 assists. Despite being without Wade Baldwin, Arturs Zagars and Scottie Wilbekin, many players stepped up and stood out in this important game, in which Fenerbahce also grabbed the potential head-to-head tie-break advantage over Efes.
Skylar Mays had his first start after coming off the bench in his previous 12 EuroLeague apperances. He tallied 9 points and a PIR of 11 after previously averaging 3.2 points and a PIR of 2.2. Mays was not the only player to take a step forward as Marko Guduric, Devon Hall and Tarik Biberovic all had extraordinary performances.
Guduric had a superb all-around performance with 17 points, 7 rebounds, 7 assists (matching his career-best) and a season-high PIR of 30. Hall also contributed 11 points, 5 rebounds, 6 assists and 0 turnovers. Hall and Guduric combined for 13 of the team's 19 assists against just 9 turnovers.
"We struggled lately. We had to come out and try to defend our home court. And we played a lot of times against Efes, so we know them pretty well," Guduric said after the game. "I think we did a good job defensively. We were talking a lot about defense throughout the week. I think defensively we were good and it's good to start the new year with the win, definitely."
Biberovic did what he does best: shoot the ball effectively. He made 5 of 8 three-pointers on his way to 17 points, which matched his best scoring effort of the season.
"I shoot and shoot, you know what I say, I never lose my confidence. Today I felt great, and that's all I can say. I'm just focused on my team, to be honest, not on my performance," Biberovic.
Both Guduric and Biberovic highlighted their team's defensive effort in the second half. And as it often happens, defense led to a fluid offense in which all of the available perimeter players contributed.
"At halftime, we talked about it. We had to be more physical defensively and tried to convert those stops in points in the second half and we succeeded in that," Biberovic said. "We were way better defensively, way more physical. We started switching and Khem [Birch] was doing a great job defensively on the smalls, and the guards were boxing out. We really did what coach wanted and this is the result."
"I think it comes from defense, just getting stops and running in fastbreak, being aggressive, having that driving mentality. We always talk about it and that's it," Guduric concluded.
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