Crvena Zvezda mts Belgrade bounced back from a couple of losses in a row by downing UNICS Kazan 77-84 on the road on Friday, and taking a better care of the ball was key to that return to winning ways.
Telling numbers: Zvezda beat UNICS at its own game, steals
Zvezda limited turnovers to just 13 against UNICS, which was one of the biggest keys to this game. UNICS is the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague's runaway leader in steals (9.3 spg.) this season, but only managed to take 7 against Zvezda. UNICS forward John Brown leads the league with an average of almost 3 steals per game, but got only 1 against Zvezda's safe ball-handlers on Friday.
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On the other hand, Zvezda forced UNICS into as many as 18 turnovers, matching its season-high. UNICS previously had that many turnovers against FC Barcelona in Round 22.
Zvezda made that happen with a season-high 12 steals, which means that two-thirds of UNICS's turnovers ended up directly in the hands of the visitors. That was also Zvezda's highest numbers of steals since getting 14 against LDLC ASVEL Villeurbanne in December 2019. Austin Hollins, Branko Lazic and Aaron White each contributed 2 steals to the effort.