The forward came up big in the fourth quarter after the hosts saw their big lead trimmed
Isiaha Mike stepped up in crunch time for Partizan against Baskonia
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Regular Season
Round 27 of 34
Group Regular Season
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Partizan Mozzart Bet Belgrade took a big step towards securing a postseason spot in the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague with an 86-73 home win over Baskonia Vitoria-Gasteiz, improving to 15-12 and moving up to eighth in the standings after blowing hot and cold against the visitors.
Having opened up a 45-20 lead late in the first half on the back of a whopping 27-2 run, Partizan saw its advantage slashed to 74-69 midway through the fourth quarter before Isiaha Mike made a pair of clutch threes and forced the battling Baskonia into submission.
The result allowed Partizan to avoid what would have been another costly slip-up on its home court after losing to struggling Virtus Segafredo Bologna and LDLC ASVEL Villeurbanne earlier in the regular season, as Baskonia threatened to stage a stunning upset.
Mike, who came off the bench and did a fine and thankless job at the other end of the court in the first half when Partizan ramped up its defense, enabled the home fans inside Belgrade Arena to breathe a collective sigh of relief as he scored all his 8 points late in the game.
Mike’s contribution complemented that of player of the game Carlik Jones, who racked up 21 points to go with 6 boards and as many assists, and Sterling Brown as the Serbian team’s sharpshooter added 19 points, 4 boards and 3 assists.
Jones praised Partizan’s first-half defense and Mike’s all-round effort after the latter had struggled with his recent form, with Partizan’s offense ground to a halt late in the third quarter and early in the fourth.
“Basketball is a game of runs,” Jones said in his postgame comments. “They (Baskonia) had a tough first half and credit to our defense as we made a lot of stops. In the second half we got away from that a little bit but we stayed locked in.
“Tonight, Mike showed up and he played great, he did all the small things like guarding and rebounding and that’s all you can ask for. Then, in crunch time when the chips were down, he was in the right spots and knocked down some big shots.”
Partizan next faces a pair of tough road games against Olympiacos Piraeus and Barcelona, prompting Brown to emphasize how vital it was for the Serbian outfit to make home-court advantage count in the battle to stay in the postseason picture.
“It’s a huge win as we’re now taking it one game at a time and not looking too far ahead,” he said. “We’ve definitely got to take care of business on our home court as we’ve dropped a couple of games earlier this season. We’ve got a couple of challenging matchups on the road coming up, so we’ve now got to focus on that.”