Strong third quarter gives us the win in the capital

ELTE-BEAC Újbuda - Sopron Basket 66-95 (21-23, 21-25, 7-23, 17-24)
Budapest

ELTE-BEAC Újbuda: Laklóth 10/6, Szabó II. 7/3, Schlott 17/3, Mérész 4, Fogg 5/3 Sub.: Galántai 7/3, Zsámár 6/3, Tóth F. 5/3, Juhász 5, Laufer -, Vincze V. -

Sopron Basket: January 12/3, Varga K. 4, Crvendakic 6, Dupree 14, Határ 10 Sub.: Brooks 18/3, Fegyverneky 8, Weninger 7/3, Dubei 7/3, Jovanovic 7, Varga A. 2

Stats

2-PTS: 11/31 35% ill. 36/56 64%

3-PTS: 8/19 42% ill. 4/13 31%

FTS: 20/23 87% ill. 11/16 69%

Rebounds: 29 (Fogg 6) ill. 39 (Dupree, Brooks 7-7)

Assists: 14 (Laklóth 4) ill. 27 (January 7)

Steals: 3 (Schlott 2) il. 6 (Jovanovic 3)

Turnovers: 13 ill. 5

Faults: 18 ill. 21

VAL: 60 (Schlott 17) ill. 133 (Dupree 26)

The game began with a real shootout, both sides were making shots left and right so the score was tight too (3rd minute 7-8). We were always a step ahead of the hosts but couldn’t pull away from them. That changed by the middle of the quarter when we were ahead by six after a lay-up by Betti, but then Fogg hit a triple to cut her team’s deficit in half (5th minute 13-16). A bit later Laklóth hit one from outside to come as close to us as one point, but then Tina was able to hold them off with a double. However, Tóth managed to score a triple as well, with which she tied the game up at 21, and forced our first time-out. We had the last laugh in the quarter, though, Alíz buried a double to give us a slight advantage before the end of the first period (10th minute 21-23).


Tina split a pair of free throws and so did Jeca to start the second quarter, while Tóth scored for two at the other end (12th minute 23-25). After that triples started falling in on both ends, Jeca and Briann both made one, while Schlott did the same for the home side, to which Galántai added a double (28-31). The game kept flowing, and it still looked the same as before, whenever we managed to pull away a bit, BEAC found a way to come right back at us (18th minute 38-39). Then Zsófi and Kami were both able to score for two, holding off yet another comeback effort by BEAC. The first half ended with a lay-up by Zsófi giving us a six-point lead (20th minute 42-48).


Jeca opened the second half with two quick baskets giving us a double-digit lead for the first time in the game (42-52). Candice stretched our scoring run to 6-0 before Schlott managed to score three times from the foul line. We seemed to have found our rhythm in this period, because we were able to deliver on offense and at the same time come up with some nice stops on defense, and after a basket by Aleks Judit Balogh decided that she needed to talk things over with her team in a time-out (26th minute 45-61). Tina made a lay-up after the short pause, to which Laklóth answered back from behind the arc. Then it was our time to shine again, we came up with a 6-0 run to increase our lead over twenty points before the end of the period (30th minute 49-71).


Briann got the final stage of the game going with a lay-up, to which Laklóth answered back with two free throws (32nd minute 51-73). This last quarter was more like the first two in terms of efficiency, but we were still controlling the game ang slowly but surely increasing our lead, which stood at 25 points at that time (36th minute 58-83). In the last few minutes BEAC tried to reduce the gap as low as possible, but we managed to win this last quarter, too, and thanks to a big defensive showing in the third period we came away with a win from the capital (40th minute 66-95).

Dávid Gáspár: I can speak for the entire team when I say we are ashamed of our performance in the first half, that wasn't worthy of us! Our game got better in the second half, but we can't just go past our performance in the first half.

Candice Dupree: I think the first half was pretty bad. Coach asked us at half time to take it seriously and start playing defense.