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Kaunas’ team “Žalgiris” continues to sink in the Euroleague – they lost for the fifth time in a row, when basketball players Zenit from St. Petersburg landed in 75:83. Krepsinis.net traditionally offers you the most interesting duel accents.
The Zenit Plan. Xavier Pascualis actually saw Žalgiris’ match last week in Milan, where Kaunas scored points on the fast attack in the first half. This time, the Spaniard gave clear instructions to his players: force him to play a slow positional game, because “Žalgiris” feels uncomfortable in such a match. Zenit easily got their extremely slow pace going and both teams played mostly up high, with attacks lasting between 18 and 20 seconds.
Another clear plan for Zenit is to cut off Žalgiris’ defenders entirely. This automatically gave midfielder Joffrey Lauvergne and Augustin Rubit more freedom, who scored 17 in the first half of the game, 9 added by Marius Grigonis and collected all from long distance. So the trio scored 26 points out of 32.
“Zenit” aggresyviu stepoutu or double defense isolated defenders and prevented them from creating opportunities. Only in the 13th minute did M. Grigonis make the first three-point defense in this match. The other shots were not after workable combinations or combinations, but thanks to individual mastery or a successful smile when the opponent slipped or lost their sight cover.
Zenit’s physique and the tough fight under the baskets, which Žalgiris was very short during the first half of the match, also came to light. After the break, Kaunas really responded to his tough fight and the guests did not take the ball from him, and according to this indicator, Žalgiris even outscored his opponents – 12:10. It is true that the players of the Russian club scored the second chance with 3 points (13:10).
It is very strange that Žalgiris had not previously tried to exert active pressure on Kevin Pangos, who played with his teammates on Monday in Vitoria for 28 minutes against Baskonia. In the fourth quarter, Žalgiris’s team began to put pressure on the rival defender who had the ball, while the Canadian, who had 4 fouls, spent time on the bench. Perhaps it was possible to put pressure on the former Žalgiris earlier and take him down, because without K. Pangos, Zenit had big problems in attack, where their attack was completely stopped. Not for nothing with this attacking organizer on the parquet “Zenit” scored even 17 points more than the rivals, which is the best individual indicator in this match.
Same problems. It’s not worth repeating too much, so this time you can identify the same problems – again “Žalgiris” allows opponents to feel empathy during the first half of the match – 45 points missing. Kaunas residents remain the worst defending team for the first two quarters. Most likely it will remain the worst in terms of defense ranking; it will be clear when the remainder of the 11th round match will take place.
Another important factor – allowing a good pitcher from the opposing team to accelerate – this time it was Austin Hollins who scored 13 points in the first half. In the rest he added 7, scored 19 utility points and played the best game of the season. The American’s score was also helped by Artūras Milaknis’s failure to hit a triple. By the way, the veteran created a 3 plus 1 situation for former teammate KCRivers, when he missed the American and jumped too late. Overall, A. Milaknis scored just 1-of-3-for-7 points during the last three meetings, but his season hit is still excellent: 15/35 (42.9 percent).
The most painful recurring problem is the start of the opponents: in the 24th minute, Zenit had a 25-point lead (59:34). The fact that after the break it was not the people from Žalgiris who looked better and more aggressive, but the guests with a reserve of 13 points, speaks volumes. Last year we repeatedly repeated that the performance of the players when they returned from the locker room showed the hand of the coach. We apply that saying again this time: the start of the third quarter was missed at 2:14. The worst part is that Zenit were allowed to re-enter the free triples, which were scored in just 4 minutes. When you run that far, it is naive to expect your opponents to make a full recovery as a lot of effort is expended and opponents use their time to help, as we saw in the last quarter when Zenit had very long attacks, which had an ending logical, and if it was not logical. , shots still hit home, as in the case of Will Thomas when he flew an impressive 3-pointer.
“Žalgiris” also tried to find alternatives when he returned after a break with J. Lauvergne and A. Rubit’s front row, because Paul Jankūnas looked dull on both sides of the field, and Nigel Hayes couldn’t represent against player W. Thomas . To these highs was added Rokas Jokubaitis, who took the place of S. Vasturia, but the plan did not work at all and in 2 minutes these five spent 7 more points than they scored, which was the worst five in this match. R.Jokubaitis also got into the second worst five (-6 in 3 minutes 38 seconds), where P.Jankūnas, M.Grigonis, Thomasas Walkupas and J.Lauvergne were together.
conclusion. Zenit deservedly won, as they were a more tactical team than Žalgiris in both attack and defense. Everything went according to X. Pascual’s plan, which is shown in the numbers, not only in the eyesight test: Th.Walkupas, L.Lekavičius and R.Jokubaitis together scored -1 utility point and scored 11 points, getting it right 5 shots of 21. That and when the guests smothered M. Grigonis, he showed his mastery by scoring 18 points (4/4 triples), but even his advances or intrusions were completely eliminated. “Žalgiris” got stuck in a positional game, where there were often no options, and none because the opponents analyzed the combinations and options well. Each Euroleague team looks at each one, but the individual dominance of the players or the number of available combination options is also very important here, which is definitely not as broad in Žalgiris as we saw on the Zenit side.
“Žalgiris” received a good lesson against the opponent, who builds many hard barriers, and the whole game is based on the movement of basketball players without the ball. The attack was fascinated by episodes, when several attacks in a row were sought for a high penalty area and was successful, but in another attack a combination was played for the shooter, thus turning the head towards the opponent.
The game of “Žalgiris” lacks both the coach’s hand and the consistency of the lineup. S.Vasturia has once again fallen completely out of context (15 min. -4 points), but there are no great solutions, because light winger Patricio Garino is missing, who will recover at least in January or February, but many games will have to be played before. The defense shines again, lacking a strong “third number” and a more universal center with which to defend defenders. In the position of a forward on a hard edge, it’s hard to expect to do anything when you’re either P.Jankūnas or N. Hayes, who is going through a career twilight, and starts playing only in the fourth half, when he seemed to have taken a day. free. If N. Hayes himself cannot defend himself against W. Thomas, who is playing against his back, then he has to look for options that can come to the rescue, but that was not done. Schiller emphasizes the gaps in individual defense, but this is the Euroleague, where opponents really have capable players individually and if available players cannot deal with their opponents head-to-head, then a sustainable team defense must be lined up, which this is not the case at this time.
Žalgiris lost 5 times in a row or 6 of the last 7 games. This should be of great concern to the club’s coaches and fans, as there are no major breakthroughs in the game – each match proceeds according to the same plan: “Žalgiris” defends two halves badly, the rivals throw up 90 points, not even 80. He hopes that the Kaunas team will get victory after victory, but there is no common move forward. We recall that there was an attempt to use both the US version of zone defense as N. Hayes got minutes at the light edge position, but these are just trifles that will not fundamentally change the picture, and something needs to be adjusted on that.
“Žalgiris” needs a weekend off, both physically and psychologically, as the main players have already spent too many minutes on the floor for this stage of the season due to their regular play in the fights of the Lithuanian Basketball League (Betsafe -LKL). It is true that next week does not promise anything good, because Šarūnas Jasikevičius will arrive with Barcelona full of Barcelona, showing the best defense in the Euroleague and having a beastly arsenal of weapons in attack.
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