Valencia plays it in Kaunas
The ‘taronja’ must beat Zalgiris to continue aspiring to the ‘Playoffs’
BARCELONA, 30 Mar. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Valencia Basket visits Zalgiris Kaunas this Friday at the Zalgirio Arena (7:00 p.m.), on matchday 32 of the Euroleague Regular Phase, with no margin for error or safety net since a defeat would leave them out of the ‘Playoffs’ of the competition, against some Lithuanians who are in a better situation.
The ‘taronja’ will be eliminated from the Euroleague if they lose in Kaunas. There’s no more. They would also say goodbye in the event that Partizán and Baskonia win their respective duels this day. The La Fonteta team has very few qualifying options left but winning could leave them with some hope.
Álex Mumbrú’s men are playing everything for everything, who lost (92-73) this week on their visit to Red Star, taking a step back in the complicated search for the ‘Top 8’, which is moving away for the Spanish team after conceding the sixth defeat in the last seven days.
A bottomless fall that is about to give him. Unless Valencia Basket win again at the Zalgirio Arena –home of the ‘Final Four’–, as they have done in four of the last five visits and including the last one, in 2020, with an 82-94 score for the ‘taronja’ thanks to 16 points from Bojan Dubljevic.
The current situation is far from optimal for Valencia Basket, which has a negative balance of 14-17 and faces a Zalgiris (16-15) that is very alive. He will not leave this day with a ticket for the ‘Playoffs’, even if he wins, but he cannot be left out of the fight either. Something that does threaten those of Mumbrú.
“We are already coming from a complicated atmosphere, we know that this is a hot field. It is our third outing in a row and above all we must try to recover something from the trip, try to fix the small physical problems we had in the Red Star match and see if we are capable of solve them for tomorrow”, pointed out Mumbrú in the preview.
In addition, Valencia Basket needs to win and do it by more than 5 points to increase their ‘Playoffs’ options, since in this way they would get the particular ‘average’ of points against Zalgiris, who took La Fonteta’s victory in the first round (76-80). The Lithuanians beat Monaco (79-70) on the last day and want to repeat the menu with a taste of victory.
DATASHEET.
–EQUIPMENT.
ZALGIRIS KAUNAS: Taylor, Butkevicius, Ulanovas, Brazdeikis y Smits –possible quintet initial–; Giedraitis, Lekavicius, Hayes, Birutis, Lukosiunas, Polonara y Dimsa.
VALENCY BASKET: Jones, Radebaugh, Port, Web III and Dubljevic –possible starting quintet–; Harper, Claver, Alexander, Lopez-Arostegui, Evans, Hermannsson and Rivero.
–REFEREES: Javor, Mogulkoc and Rocha.
–PAVILLION: Zalgirio Arena.