Day 1 TopSixteen Eurocup

Alba Berlin - Unicaja Malaga

* It took Caki half a season to realise he can´t count on Akpinar as a leading PG. Today he started the game with his best back line (Siva, Vargas, Milosavljevic), and the beginning was not bad. The offence had a flow, players knew what they want to do – even though moves were not translated into points. Siva was having a bad night (4 points, 3 turnovers, 9 RKG), and when your only reliable PG looks like that – well, it reminds last week´s Fenerbahce.

* Then Alba changed to a back line which included Atsur, English and Milosavljevic. It lost the momentum, and later on the game. Without a real PG on the court (and Atsur is not a PG for Eurocup level), all Malaga had to do is to put some pressure on the ball. Alba was not able to score. In fact, one time they were not even able to bring back the ball in court after receiving a basket. And when your SF needs to play as a guard, you end up with turning too many balls over. 8 in the first half time, in compare to just 6 assists. Maccabi Tel Aviv has the same problem.

* Malaga commited their first foul 27 seconds to the end of the first quarter. Depite their lack of fouls, they managed to keep Alba on 12 points in the first quarter. The German team has simply not enough guards who are good enough for this level. Their dependency on Siva in offence also has a price – the guy is not the best defender. Towards the end of the game, he had a crucial box out mistake which costed Alba dearly.

* After finishing the first quarter with just two team fouls, Plaza probably asked his players to play more aggressively in defence. Malaga started the second quarter doing many unnecessary fouls, becoming over the limit 3 minutes into the second quarter. It helped Alba´s poor offence to achieve some easy points from the free point line. Alba went to the lockers at halftime after scoring only 8 baskets from the field and 7 from the free throw line.

* From the back line to the front line: that was Alba´s major problem today. With Kikanovic being injured, Alba had no real big guy in the paint. For some minutes they even used Miller as a center. And since there was no big man in the paint, Alba´s defence sagged in order to close the paint. That left Malaga player´s to shoot with 39% from beyond the arch. Another problem with Alba´s small ball was off course rebounding. The spanish team was shooting just just 8/20 from the 2pt in the first half, but they still made points with grabbing 10 offensive boards.

* In the second half Alba put pressure on the ball, forcing 12 spanish turnovers in the second half. Alba found out that after a steal (or a long rebound), running the court quickly can lead to an easy basket. Maybe putting the orange object in the basket is not such a difficult task after all. Plaza reacted well, and changed formation to a small ball, in order to stop Alba from running the court. He knew that in the half court offence Alba is pathetic.

* Alba should ask themselves some serious questions regarding their game management. They had the same precentages as Malaga from all ranges, almost same ranking points, but still managed to stay behind the spanish team all game long. And you know what? Malaga dominated the game without even playing very well. Looks like the rest of Alba´s top 16 campaign is not going to be a lot of fun.

#Eurocup #AlbaBerlin #Malaga