Basketball Bundesliga: Brose Bamberg lands important win in Frankfurt

Thanks to an away win at the Fraport Skyliners Frankfurt, Brose Bamberg is keeping pace with the top of the table and is now level on points with the top three in fourth place. The Upper Franconians kept the upper hand at the Hessians with 72:77, not trailing once, but squandering the interim 15-point lead (38:53) towards the end.

Head coach Johann Roijakkers had to do without "sharpshooter" Trevis Simpson at the weekend, who is suffering from muscular problems. Nevertheless, Bamberg started strong defensively and offensively, won four balls at the back in the first quarter and finished well with fast attacks at the front. With a 10:4 lead after two threes by Omar Prewitt and Justin Robinson, the guests pulled away to 23:14 after the first ten minutes in front of around 50 Bamberg fans. "Crazy" showed the second quarter: the 0:5 run of the Hessians to 23:19 the Roijakkers team countered with an own 10:0 (33:19), Frankfurt hit back with a 0:9 (33:28). Justin Robinson scored six of his eleven points to give the Bambergers some breathing space (41:30) before Kenneth Ogbe (12 points, 8 rebounds) scored just before the break to make it 45:32. Frankfurt, however, managed the buzzer beater at the break to make it 45:34.

The first minutes after the break belonged to the three-point shooters: Bamberg had to accept four successful distance shots from the Hessians in a row. Since Patrick Heckmann, top scorer Omar Prewitt (17 points) and Dominik Lockhart also hit their threes, and Prewitt and Heckmann also finished with lay-ups under the basket, the guests gradually pulled away to 58:43 after 25 minutes. Frankfurt improved its defense, made it more difficult for Bamberg to score and cut the gap to 62-55 by the end of the quarter. The home side opened the final period with another three-pointer, but after 62-58 the Brose boys pulled themselves together again, Christian Sengfelder (12 points), Patrick Heckmann (15 points, 6 assists) and Omar Prewitt increased the lead to 73-60 with four minutes to go. But Frankfurt held strong against it, a 0:8 run meant 75:72 only 16 seconds before the end. But Patrick Heckmann showed no weakness at the free-throw line and converted twice to win 77:72.

Johan Roijakkers (head coach Brose Bamberg): "Congratulations to my team. We played with the right intensity for 40 minutes today. It was a game of runs. Now and then we couldn't stop them, but in the right moments we were there and in the end we deserved to win."

Already next Friday, 12.10.2021, the next away game is scheduled: starting at 8.30 p.m., the Roijakkers boys want to celebrate the next victory at the EWE Baskets Oldenburg.