New reality – old story: “Žalgiris” was punished for family problems / News

On Tuesday night, there was another first generation in the “Žalgiris” arena of Kaunas. The first time Euroleague matches have been played without spectators. The first time the Lithuanian anthem is not sung before the duel. The first time Paulius Jankūnas started the match between the top five this season. The first time Nigel Hayes played third.

And yet one thing that determined the game was as common as the gray autumn skies in Lithuania: Mike James against Žalgiris was unstoppable again.

The 30-year-old 185cm defender scored 27 points, 22 of them in the second half of the game and 13 of them in the fourth quarter.

In the end, he hit the most important throw-in of the game. With Žalgiris closing in on 78:79 in the final minute of the game, James scored a three-point lead over Augustine Rubit with 42 seconds left. After that, he noticed two more penalties, and until the final duel’s siren flashed a triple and he was so confident of his accuracy that he simply stepped away from the basket as the ball flew towards the bow.

“I feel good playing one against one. Tonight, my opponents allowed me to play one on one and I took advantage of it, ”said James after the match.

In the second half of the match, he hit 7 shots of 8 and all 4 penalties, but coach Dimitrio Itoudis was praised for his performance throughout the match.

“He played a great game from the beginning,” Itoudis said after the match. – The way and the aggressiveness that Mike and Daniel (Hackett) played on defense is amazing, because others followed suit. Mike is excellent at creating, complying and defending himself. All the players fought. “

“We have to take our hats off because of the level they have shown,” not just James but Will Clyburn as well, Schiller said. “We were able to better deal with his last minute pitches and get some of them out.”

Although he missed 21 points in the fourth quarter, for Žalgiris it was the defense’s best quarter in all games. After knocking out James and Clyburn, the remaining CSKA players scored just 1 of 10 pitch in the fourth quarter.

The problem is that James (4/4) and Clyburn (2/2) together threw all 6 pitches and scored 19 of the 21 points for their team.

“That’s why they get those millions,” summarized Marius Grigonis.

It was a solid but difficult match for the leader of “Žalgiris”. Grigonis scored 19 points, hitting 5 3-pointers of 6, but received a fourth foul early in the third quarter and sat on the bench for about ten minutes of play.

After sitting down, Grigonis cursed so hard that in the empty arena of Žalgiris, probably all the people from the service staff, the Žalgiris administration or the journalists heard him.

This was the first Euroleague match in Kaunas completely without spectators and there was no shortage of such episodes.

After the presentation of the teams in Kaunas, the anthem is usually sung, but this time it was not. The Euroleague bans the playing of national anthems, but this new reality still hit basketball players unexpectedly: Initially, they had traditionally stopped at the reserve bench, waiting to see what would happen to the national anthem.

Even sitting a few meters from the pitch, it was clear that the Žalgiris substitute players were cheering on the team’s friends on the pitch, and Itoudis was arguing in his mother tongue with one of the referees, Greek Ioannis Foufis.

In such an environment, the violations of the rules recorded by the judges, which are not only shown with hand gestures, but are also expressed with the voice, were perfectly heard.

As disturbed in such an atmosphere, the “Žalgiris” players during the first 15 minutes of the duel were as sad as they were last week in Tel Aviv. Midway through the second half, CSKA’s lead rose to 37:22 and Schiller called for a break in the second minute of the match.

After that, Rokas Jokubaitis actively joined the game, handed out 3 assists, struck from the area and “Žalgiris” returned to the game – 34:42.

“In a way, we’re still talking about why we can’t all talk up front, help each other. It only starts in the third half,” Grigonis said after the duel. “Everyone probably comes up with their own business and doesn’t help each other. When we play together, and we have to because we are a smaller team, we look good. “

In the third half, after four consecutive points from Thomas Walkup, “Žalgiris” came close to the pitch (47:50), but even then, and later, the residents of Kaunas could not escape.

When “Žalgiris” closed the gap to 64:66 after Artūras Milaknis’ breakthrough, the Russians responded with an 8-0 scoreline, which was marked by 3s from Clyburn and James.

Kaunas then scored 8 points in a row, but his enthusiasm was again cooled by Clyburn, who scored from afar.

After Jankūnas approached “Žalgiris” at 78:79 with a free kick, James spoke his word, shining with a precise shot.

It was reminiscent of James’ performance last year in a match between these teams in Moscow, where he scored 10 points in the final 63 seconds of extra time, including a victorious shot with a siren.

This time “Žalgiris” still had 42 seconds after James ‘shot, but they didn’t even manage to hit the basket, and Kaunas Grigonis’ most productive player missed the ball.

First, after a minute of rest, Kaunas chose to throw the ball from behind the baseline on his side of the court, rather than from behind the center line side. Thus, “Žalgiris” got 24 seconds instead of 14 seconds for the attack, but here they did not need a long attack.

To have two attacks, Kaunas had to attack in 10-12 seconds, but there didn’t seem to be much urgency on this issue.

According to the plan, “Žalgiris” had to play pikenpopą with Jokubaitis and Rubit, but after the change for the latter, James and “Žalgiris” North Americans did not attack in the twelfth of the attack. Even then, it was clear that there was very little time for Žalgiris.

Rubitas finally tried to focus against the much shorter James, missed, threw the ball to Jokubaitis, and he opted not to shoot, but to pass Jankūnas, which ended in an error.

“I hit and suddenly the ball fell under my basket,” Jokubaitis recalled this attack. – Of course, now it can be said that I had to throw or jump Tornike Schengen, because he really would have danced, but now it is very difficult to say how things would have turned out. It seemed to me that Shengelia would dance on top of me, but I chose to pass Paulius Jankūnas, whose ball had not yet arrived.

For me, this is a very painful mistake that has kept us from victory. A little sad. Really. “

After James realized the penalties, Žalgiris took another minute of rest, but it didn’t pay off either: the ball was thrown under the basket to Joffrey Lauvergne, where Tornike Šengelija, who ran to the rescue, helped catch the ball.

This dissolved any hope of victory.

“We really looked stronger on defense, as well as losing 87 points,” Jokubaitis said. – However, in my opinion, the first half of the game is to blame. After a long break, we fixed the defense and the outlook was not bad. In the second part we did what the technician asked us.

Of course at the end of the game we get a lot of heavy shots that are difficult to cover. The game was not determined by poor defense, but by the mastery of the CSKA players. “

James scored 22 team points after a long break and it was a good job Žalgiris did against other CSKA players.

For example, Šengelija played the worst game of this season: he scored 7 points in 25 minutes, making only 3 shots out of 10.

The poster was covered by Jankūnas from the beginning of the match, which started the duel for the first time this season in the starting five and in 19.5 minutes. bounced 6 balls.

Schiller’s decision allowed Hayes to play third for the first time this season, which remains one of the most important at the start of Žalgiris’ headache season.

With Patricio Garino, who may not even have the entire season, Kaunas fill the light forward position with Grigonis, Milaknis and Steve Vasturia.

The problems under the basket, where Hayes is the most mobile stop, remain obvious, Rubit can also change on defense, and the rest of the centers suffer from a lack of speed. In a match with CSKA, Joffrey Lauvergne in general seemed to have lost his compass in defense or in the fight for the ball, and as a result several times he was even reproached by Schiller.

“Žalgiris” lost in the Euroleague for the third time in a row and will play in Milan this week. The good news is that Mike James will no longer be there.