By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Zalgiris Kaunas had made the comeback, trailing by one (79-78) with one minute left. Mike James got the ball in his hands, the clock was ticking and he drained his fourth three of the night. Zalgiris couldn’t score again after that and CSKA got the 87-78 road win.
“I am good in iso situations”, James said after the game. “I feel really comfortable doing that. They left me one-on-one today and I was able to capitalize”.
After missing last week’s game as CSKA announced without specifying the reason for this decision, James was back for good with 27 points, eight of them unanswered in the last minute.
“Mike has certain well-known abilities to create, to execute and to defend and he was competitive like most of our players”, said CSKA coach Dimitris Itoudis who also added that per team policy he can’t comment on James’ absence last week.
Will Clyburn added 13 points and a clutch three in the closing minutes, while Darrun Hilliard also had 12.
Marius Grigonis – who received the October MVP award before the game – with 19 points and Thomas Walkup with 10 were the scoring leaders of Zalgiris, which trailed from wire to wire, but almost stole the win at the end.
Still, when Mike James called “game”, nobody could match him as CSKA got to a 6-3 record and Zalgiris dropped to 5-4.
“Obviously, this is a new team, we have some new pieces and everybody is getting back. I think we are gelling together and we are going to keep this thing rolling”, added Clyburn as CSKA Moscow was still missing Johannes Voigtmann, Alexander Khomenko, and Janis Strelnieks due to illness and injury.
Photo credit: CSKA Moscow