s.Oliver Würzburg defeats Bremerhaven Polar Bears 80:71

As in the previous two games, the long 40-minute path to its eighth home victory in the easyCredit German Basketball League in the s.Oliver Arena was – as befitted the fact that it was the day of a public festival and fair – a rollercoaster encounter with ups and downs for Würzburg: The scores were tied on nine occasions and the lead changed hands eleven times. “We made life difficult for ourselves again today because we didn’t control the boards and so gave Bremerhaven too many second bites at the cherry,” said Florian Koch afterwards.

The Polar Bears snapped up a total of 14 offensive rebounds, nine of them in the first half. Elston Turner, Chris Warren and Armani Moore also drained four buckets from outside in the opening eight minutes of the encounter to put their side 12:18 ahead, although the home side was then able to tie the scores by the end of the period (20:20).

The scores were still level after 13 minutes (24:24), but then the club from Northern Germany was again able to open up a slight gap thanks to a three by new signing Armani Moore and a jump shot from its top scorer Elston Turner (17 points/5 threes). Head Coach Denis Wucherer responded by calling a timeout, after which his team showed a sharp improvement in defense and only conceded two points in the final seven minutes of the first half.

To the jubilation of the fans, Skyler Bowlin buried his first bucket from beyond the arc to tie the game at 29:29 in the 17th minute and then followed suit one minute later to help s.Oliver Würzburg go in at the break in front by 37:31.

The second half began with a steal by Cameron Wells, after which Devin Oliver stretched the gap from the foul line (38:31). However, the home side was not able to pull further away because Bremerhaven again drained three buckets from downtown and so snatched a narrow lead once more in the 24th minute (42:43). The encounter remained close up to the end of the third period, as the lead changed hands several times almost by the minute. s.Oliver Würzburg took a narrow 60:59 advantage into the final quarter, in which it was then able to seal victory with another improvement in defense and well carved-out shots from beyond the arc.

Florian Koch, Würzburg’s top scorer with 14 points, began the fourth quarter with a three to make it 63:59, and a short time later the gap had grown to six points again (67:61 in the 33rd minute). Bremerhaven did not give up, but instead stepped up a gear in defense and fought back with two lay-ups by Darnell Jackson to cut the deficit to 67:65 in the 36th minute.

The encounter was decided in the 39th minute when Skyler Bowlin drained a three to make the score 74:68, after which Bremerhaven was not able to get a shot away within the allotted 24 seconds on its next attack. At the other end, the free-standing Xavier Cooks was picked out twice by his teammates at the arc and drained both threes to make the final score 80:71.

“Like against Jena and Frankfurt, we again found the spark of energy we required at the end to clinch victory. We need every win to reach the playoffs and all the players know that,” said Florian Koch.

source: https://www.soliver-wuerzburg.de