Mirotic makes his debut and leads Barça to victory in Berlin
The Spanish-Montenegrin star scored 19 points after months injured
BARCELONA, Dec. 1 (.) –
Barça beat ALBA Berlin this Thursday (86-88) at the Mercedes-Benz Arena, on matchday 11 of the Euroleague Regular Phase, in Nikola Mirotic’s ‘debut’ after his long injury with 19 points and leading the blaugrana in victory, in a match of constant comings and goings.
It was not a pleasant return for Nikola Mirotic, who had to put the team behind him as if he were rolling and in full game rhythm. But quality is not lost and the Spanish-Montenegrin had 19 points, 6 rebounds, 2 assists and 3 steals for a PIR of 29.
Mirotic is back and, with him, Barça once again aspires to everything. Without the ’33’ things have gone well, but now they are expected to improve. And one aspect to review is that of perseverance, that of not lowering your arms at certain times. Tonight, those ups and downs led to a give and take, some comings and goings, which came close to costing Barça the victory.
Despite dominating two of the rooms with solvency and enjoying good maximums (55-71, +16), Barça had to suffer two great reactions from ALBA, coached by the Spanish Israel González. What seemed like an easy win turned into a tight finish in which the free kicks, drop by drop, tipped the scales in favor of the ‘culés’.
And in that victory Mirotic had a lot of weight, with 4 triples scored in 5 attempts. A very hot doll to have been close to 200 days without playing. Nico Laprovittola were also good, until he was eliminated by personal, and Cory Higgins. On the other hand, in the painting Mirotic was too alone.
With this victory, as a ‘self-gift’ for Mirotic in his season debut, Barça continues its good run of three victories and is temporarily second. For its part, ALBA continues in free fall, bottom, with 8 consecutive defeats. Mirotic prevented Barça from being Berlin’s salvation.
DATA SHEET.
–RESULT: ALBA BERLIN, 86 – BARÇA, 88 (46-45, at halftime).
–EQUIPMENT.
ALBA BERLIN: Smith (15), Sikma (8), Olinde (4), Lammers (2) and Koumadje (8) –starting five–; Lo (9), Procida (2), Delow (2), Wetzell (2), Thiemann (12), Blatt (17) and Zoosman (5).
BARÇA: Laprovittola (16), Satoransky (11), Kalinic (7), Mirotic (19) and Tobey (11) –starting five–; Da Silva (1), Paulí (-), Vesely (6), Higgins (15), Kuric (-), Jokubaitis (2) and Nnaji (-).
— PARTIALS: 19-30, 27-15, 11-26 and 29-17.
–REFEREES: Javor, Vyklivky and Obrknezevic. They eliminated Laprovittola at Barça.
–HALL: Mercedes-Benz Arena.
