BBC Coburg lets the bells ring in Erfurt - Vestädter dominate Basketball Lions

Two days before the Gloriosa in Erfurt Cathedral rings out for Christmas, BBC Coburg let the bells ring in the Thuringian capital. The Veststädter won 68-104 at the Basketball Löwen on Friday evening, continuing their run in the BARMER 2. Basketball Bundesliga ProB. With seven wins in a row, Coburg's basketball players sweetened their Christmas.

Without Tyseem Lyles and captain Jan Heber, the Basketball Lions from Erfurt lacked bite against BBC Coburg. The Vestädtern, on the other hand, managed to compensate for the absences of the two key players Blunt and Carrasco seemingly without any problems, as in the previous week. The youngsters stepped into the breach in the cathedral city as well, with Adrian Petkovic hitting six of eight threes and Adrian Worthy again recording 23 points. In addition, there was a solid performance by Leon Bulic and a biting captain Sven Lorber in the defense, which gave the 1500 fans in the sold-out Erfurt Rieth Sporthalle no reason to cheer. The ex-Erfurt player in the service of the BBC, Lucas Wobst, opened the match immediately with two consecutive goals for a quick 4:0 for Coburg.

At 3:11 from the home side's point of view, Erfurt coach Enrico Kufuor pulled the ripcord and asked his team for a timeout. As in the first quarter of the previous match day, almost everything continued to work for the Vesteststädter on the offensive. Against the aggressive Coburg defense, the Cathedral City team could not find an answer. At the other end, six of eight three-pointers fell for the Upper Franconians. The first quarter ended at 24:36.

Despite the high lead, the Coburg team continued to defend physically and paid for this with many fouls. Already at the beginning of the second period, eleven team fouls were recorded by the guests. The pace of the three-pointer festival from the first period was also unstoppable for the BBC. Nevertheless, they remained focused and made few mistakes. In the first half, Coburg allowed themselves only three ball losses. Adrian Worthy ran hot in the second quarter. With his eleven and twelve points, he extended the BBC lead to 20 just three minutes before the break. It went into halftime with a 38:57 lead.

What BBC coach Jessie Miller criticized the previous week worked better on Friday night in Erfurt: there was no slump in the third quarter this time, the guests continued to act with concentration and did not let the Lions come back into the game. When Erfurt's Otto Fahrenhorst pulled the trigger for his team from downtown and scored, he could only reduce the score to 43:64. In the third, Adrian Petkovic got going. After he sank two threes within a few minutes, Lions coach Kufuor took another timeout. But BBC had already pulled away with 29 points. With a small run at the end of the third quarter, the home side was able to close the gap to 53:73.

When Erfurt's Farenhorsts then made it 59:75 with a three-pointer eight and a half minutes before the end, Coburg's coach Miller was visibly served and swore her team in again in a timeout. The guests allowed themselves more ball losses, but 18-year-old Petkovic kept his nerve and answered the Löwen run single-handedly with eight points in two minutes. Too much for the psyche of the hosts, who finally gave up.