Maccabi Tel Aviv overwhelmed Baskonia 113-85 on Tuesday night in Belgrade to advance to the Euroleague quarterfinals, where it will play Panathinaikos in a best-of-5 series beginning next Tuesday night in Athens.
Lorenzo Brown came out firing on all cylinders at Stark Arena to help give the yellow-and-blue a quick 28-15 lead after the first frame as Oded Katash’s team never looked back. Maccabi continued to run circles around Dusko Ivanovic’s squad and shot the lights out from deep – going 19-of-36 (52.7%) from three-point land – to notch the win.
With the victory, Maccabi officially ended the regular season in seventh place and will now face the second-place team, Panathinaikos. The first two games will be played in Greece next Tuesday and Thursday.
"We deserved to be in the playoffs after this crazy year"
The yellow-and-blue will then see the series move the following week to its home-away-from-home in Serbia for Game 3 and, if necessary, Game 4, while the series decider would be back at OAKA Arena in Athens the week after that.
The series winner will then advance to the Final Four in Berlin, Germany, where it will be joined by the other three teams that advance out of their respective series.
Baskonia will have one last chance to get into the playoffs when it faces Bologna, which defeated Anatoly EFES 67-64 in their Play-in game on Friday night. The winner will advance to play Real Madrid, arguably the best team in the competition.
On Tuesday, Brown led Maccabi with 29 points, Wade Baldwin added 26, and Bonzie Colson scored 14 in the win. Codi Miller-McIntyre scored 32 points, and Markus Howard chipped in with 14 for Baskonia in the loss.
“I am very happy for the players,” Katash said after the game. “Before we got out of the locker room I told them ‘just enjoy it, we deserve it, play our game.’ Most of the game we executed really well defensively and offensively. I feel like we deserved to be in the playoffs after this crazy year and I am very happy for the Maccabi organization. The players showed a lot of character.”
“Congratulations to Maccabi; they were the better team,” said Baskonia’s coach, Ivanovic. They played really well, and they had Lorenzo Brown, who did a tremendous amount. We tried and fought hard, but it was impossible. Maccabi is one of the best physical teams in the Euroleague, and the problem was not Maccabi so much but ourselves.”
Brown, the game’s MVP, also spoke about the victory.
“It’s a beautiful feeling right now. We’ve had a lot of adversity this year, but we have been sticking with it and staying together, which is the most important part for our team. Guys had great seasons, but now it’s about the playoffs now, and paying attention to detail will be even more crucial. It’s been a long year for me, playing this whole season through injury and other things as well with our team, but we have been pushing through it and letting everything flow by while paying attention to playing our best basketball.”
Brown came out on fire with a pair of triples and Baldwin went from inside and outside to get the game going for Maccabi as Vanja Marinkovic tried to keep Baskonia close, but the Israeli hosts took an early 13-8 lead midway through the first quarter.
Brown went from deep yet again while Antonius Cleveland also scored from long distance out of a timeout, Howard scored his first points of the game with a catch-and-shoot corner three-ball for the visitors, but yet another three-pointer from Tamir Blatt and a midrange jumper from Brown gave the yellow-and-blue a 13-point lead after 10 minutes of action.
Jasiel Rivero opened the second quarter with a jumper from the charity stripe, Tadas Sedekirskis responded, while Colson and Brown added a pair of buckets as Maccabi started to run away. Then Baldwin put down a massive dunk off the wing and hit a jumper to give Maccabi a 41-21 lead with 5:57 left in the half.
Colson fed Josh Nebo for a dunk, while Nikos Rogkavopoulos tried to keep Ivanovic’s squad in the game. But Colson hit a spur of baskets and Brown went for another pair from beyond the arc before Cody Miller-McIntyre scored the final five points of the period. Still Katash’s team took a 55-36 advantage into the halftime break.
Howard started off the third quarter from deep for Baskonia, Colson matched him, and Jake Cohen knocked down a triple for Maccabi. Rogkavopoulos and Sedekiskis scored to try and get Baskonia into the game, but Brown went from deep yet again to keep Maccabi ahead by 20 points (69-49) midway through the frame.
Baldwin put in a trio of baskets, Rivero put down a dunk, Howard went from deep, while Cleveland and James Webb answered for Tel Aviv and Blatt went from downtown to bump the lead up to 86-61 after 30 minutes of end-to-end action that tilted one way.
Howard began the fourth quarter just as he did the third from downtown, Webb used the glass for a deuce and then dunked, as Jordan Theodore and Miller-McIntyre tried to give the Spaniards one last gasp at making a run.
But Blatt, Baldwin and Brown all went from deep to wrap up the victory.
Baldwin also spoke about the victory and looked ahead to the matchup with Panathinaikos.
“We had another 48 hours between games, and that’s been crazy. First and foremost, we want to shout out to Israel and the defense system that is protecting us as players and getting out here and dealing with the circumstances. Our team really appreciates the support that we get from our country and from our fans.