Brose Baskets extend lead at the top of the table

Brose Baskets gained revenge for the defeat on the road against Basketball Lions Braunschweig earlier in the season with a 77:57 home victory – and also repaid the 0:11 trouncing in overtime back then by producing a run of 16 points without reply shortly before the end. Elsewhere, Alba Berlin slipped up for the third time in a row, meaning the team of Head Coach Andrea Trinchieri is outright leader in the Beko German Basketball League, one win ahead of Alba Berlin and Bayern Munich.

Brose Baskets got off to a strong start, mainly thanks to top scorer Ryan Thompson (23 points): The American drained two buckets from beyond the arc in the first three minutes, then stole possession at the center line and made a slam-dunk to put Brose Baskets 12:3 in front. Braunschweig changed its tactics in defense and produced a 7:0 run to slash the deficit to 12:10. Yet when Braunschweig’s top scorer Tim Abromaitis made it 17:15, the home side stepped up a gear in offense: a quick five points from Thompson were followed by two threes by youngster Andi Obst, after which Daniel Theis scored from outside to give his side a clear 33:21 lead after the first period. The second quarter picked up where the first ended: Janis Strelnieks chalked up five points and Ryan Thompson added a lay-up to put his side ahead by the wide margin of 41:21. However, Bamberg was not able to maintain its phenomenal shooting percentage of 72 up to the break. Trinchieri’s players did not manage to score from the field anymore and the only points came from two free throws by Dawan Robinson. However, Bamberg’s rock-solid defense only allowed the visitors to add nine points, meaning the home side went into the break 43:30 ahead.

Bamberg had great difficulty getting back into the game after the break: its shots no longer dropped in offense and its moves were piecemeal. So it was no surprise that the opposing side from Lower Saxony reduced the gap to 56:49 by the end of the period. Ryan Thompson drained a three at the start of the final quarter to make it 59:49, but then the home side suffered another barren spell, failing to score for four minutes and letting Braunschweig cut the deficit to 59:53. However, the bucket from beyond the arc by Janis Strelnieks with four minutes to go broke the spell, after which the Latvian playmaker and Dawan Robinson both buried two threes in the space of 55 seconds to take their personal haul to 11 points each. Trevor Mbakwe (10 points) and Elias Harris completed the 16:0 run with two slam-dunks to give Bamberg a 77:57 win and its 13th victory in succession in the German league.

Andrea Trinchieri commented: “When we ahead by 20 points, we thought we had finished the job and won the game. We became slipshod, took wrong decisions and made simple mistakes. I’m a little shocked at how we performed in this spell. I’ll have to think carefully about what I say to the team – after all, we still keep on managing to win games. Actually, it’s always a positive thing when you win games where the team does not play well. That means we have a lot of potential.”

Brose Baskets are not back in action until ten days’ time: since Alba Berlin is playing in the Euroleague on Friday evening, the game against it in the German league has been postponed till May 3, 2015. Their next encounter is therefore on Wednesday, March 4, 2015: the first leg in the last sixteen of the Eurocup against Lokomotiv Kuban Krasnodar, which is unbeaten in 15 games. The tip-off in the Brose Arena is at 7 p.m.