Basketball: medi bayreuth starts the second half of the season with a 64:80 loss to ratiopharm ulm

Fight, self-confidence and team spirit were what Head Coach Mladen Drijincic demanded from his team in his first game as medi Head Coach. The team spirit was right, but in terms of self-confidence, the 57-year-old head coach still has some work to do with his team before next weekend's away game in Hamburg after Sunday night's 64-80 home defeat to ratiopharm ulm.

Just 66 seconds into the game, medi was already trailing 0:8. However, a successful three-point shot by Jackson Rowe woke up the team and after a good three minutes Ahmet Hill equalized with a three-pointer to make it 8:8.

Medi was now well into the game and with 3:33 minutes left in the first quarter, they were just ahead. But the Ulm team took advantage of a short phase of weakness. A 10:0 run of the guests meant the 15:23 only 87 seconds before the end of the quarter. medi, however, fought back once again and with two threes of Ignas Sargiunas and Osaro Rich they could reduce the lead to 21:23.

This time, the start of the quarter belonged to the home side, who regained the lead with a basket by Ignas Sargiunas at 24:23. After that, the game remained completely balanced until 30:32. Within 60 seconds, the Swabians went on a 9:0 run and pulled away to 41:30. Ulm, however, continued to score and went into the halftime break with a 48:33 lead.

And also after the change of sides medi had a hard time. It took almost four minutes before Bastian Doreth scored the first medi points in the second half with a three-pointer. But things did not get any better after the Capitano's basket success. The 38:64 interim score was to be the highest lead of the evening for the guests. Although medi continued to fight back to the best of their ability, the deficit could only be minimally reduced until 44:66 after the third period.

In the final quarter, the Ulm team knew how to manage the lead. medi was able to win the last period 20:14, but there was no longer any doubt about the deserved Ulm victory in the last ten minutes.

Mladen Drijencic (Head Coach medi bayreuth):

"It was a great feeling to finally stand on a BBL floor again and to be able to do what I've been doing my whole life, coaching. In some situations we still acted unfortunate, often we didn't take good care of the ball or didn't move to the basket consistently enough. Offensively, we simply have to play faster, especially against physical defenses like Ulm played today. They didn't make it easy for us to play an organized attack. We definitely have to work on that in practice. We also have to do a better job of match-up order on the field. Only training will help here."

For our team, it's off to the far north next weekend, as the duel at Veolia Towers Hamburg is on the schedule for Saturday, February 11. Jump in the edel-optics.de arena to the game of the 20th matchday is at 18:00 clock.