By Eurohoops team / info@eurohoops.net
Anadolu Efes defeated Olimpia Milano 77 – 65 in Game 3 of the EuroLeague playoffs to take a 2-1 lead in the series and get one win away from its third straight trip to the Final Four. The reigning champions can check their ticket to the tournament in Belgrade Thursday (28/4) in front of their home crowd.
The trio of Vasilije Micic (20 points, five assists), Tibor Pleiss (17 points, five rebounds) and Shane Larkin (16 points, five assists) led Efes in scoring with the latter being the main figure behind a decisive 16 – 2 run by their team in the last five minutes.
Devon Hall (16 points, five assists) put Milano ahead 61 – 63 with five minutes to play and after his team came back from down 14 points (42-28). Everything changed after a timeout by Ergin Ataman that was followed by an 11 – run and back-to-back triples courtesy of Micic and Larkin.
Shavon Shields made it 72 – 65 to retain Milano’s winning chances but Larkin responded with five straight points that sealed the victory of Efes. “We have championship pedigree,” he said. “We’ve been here. We’ve been doing this for four years. We’ve had a lot of success as a team, so we trust each other, we never panic and we made some big plays at the end like we usually do. One game away. That’s a great team over there, so we have to focus up, it’s definitely not over yet. We have to come out with a lot of intensity on Thursday and try to finish it at home.”
Apart from Hall, Jerian Grant had 11 points on 3-3 triples in his best EuroLeague game with Milano that is now facing a knockout situation in Game 4. Ettore Messina will have to deal with the key absences of Nicolo Melli and Malcolm Delaney once more.
“I’ll use the word that Coach Ataman used at the end of Game 2. We had momentum, we went up 3, and then we played the last 4 minutes not probably in the most smart way that we could have and they had their superstar close the game,” Messina said. He saw his players destroying Efes on the boards 33 – 24 and grabbing 14 offensive rebounds but this dominance was still not enough to bring the win.
In praise of Shane Larkin
Efes coach Ergin Ataman made a special mention to the Larkin’s buckets in crunch time that helped overcome Milano’s obstacle.
“It wasn’t my timeout [that made the difference], Shane Larkin came back in the game and played like a champion because we had a big problem on offense,” Ataman said. “Defensively we played a great game, but we had a problem with rebounds. We gave a lot of baskets after offensive rebounds, extra baskets without defensive possessions. And on offense, we missed some everything until the last 56- minutes when Shane came back to the game. He found incredible baskets – this is his game – and we cracked the game. This playoff is not easy, I understand the players also Milan made a great effort. Now it’s only 2-1. There will be one more great game on Thursday.”