Despite the fact that Krasnodar and Krasnoyarsk are 3,888 kilometers away from each other, there is no club closer to Lokomotiv in the VTB United League than Yenisei. Even after Zakhar Vedischev moved to Dynamo Vladivostok, our alumni Timofey Gerasimov, Sergey Balashov and Sergey Dolinin still play there; Vladislav Bliznyuk, who belongs to Lokomotiv, is on loan there; relatives of Kirill Yelatontsev and Aleksandr Gudumak live in Krasnoyarsk. So there is always someone to cheer for us in the stands of the Sever Arena. Including the workers of the Krasnoyarsk Railway.
It was Yelatontsev who scored the first points for Loko this evening. But Kirill Temirov got two fouls in the first minute, went to the bench to cool down a bit, and Yenisey slightly ran away – 2:6. Patrick Miller scored from beyond the arc; Antonius Cleveland blocked a long shot by Victor Sanders, sending Isaiah Whaley to dunk in transition. Sanders did not calm down and in the next attack he still scored a 3-pointer – but Yelatontsev did the same! And soon Danil Sheyanov spectacularly put the ball into the basket – 14:17 in favor of the hosts in the 6th minute.
But as soon as the coaches gave Yelatontsev a break, Loko’s game stopped working without a center. In attack, everything came down to difficult throws from sizeable distances; in defense, they could not find an antidote for the tall Roman Zagretdinov. As a result, by the end of the quarter, Yenisei created a double-digit advantage – 16:26.
Despite short bursts of bright attacking play – such as Sheyanov’s breakthrough or Yelatontsev’s mid-range shot after a pass from Tahjere McCall – Lokomotiv’s play in the 2nd quarter looked woefully. There were no ideas on offense, and no one could cope with Sanders, who was on fire, scoring in any way imaginable: from afar, from mid-range on a very high parabola, from under the hoop with two opponents fouling on him… At one point, Loko was ahead by 21 points – 30:51!
Only at 19th minute did our team suddenly came to their senses. McCall scored a hard one, Miller made an interception and made 2+1. An urgently taken timeout did not help Yenisei: Cleveland stole the ball away from Gerasimov and got two more points. And in the very last second of the quarter, Dmitry Uzinsky managed to score another ball – and now it was “only” 41:53!
After the side switch, Loko continued to press hard. Yelatontsev scored a very difficult ball with hard resistance from several opponents. Seconds later, Miller made a quarterback pass to same Yelatontsev. After Whaley scored 2+1, the score became 48:53 – thus, our team’s run at the junction of two quarters was 18:2!
Only in the 24th minute, Yenisei was able to score its first points in the second half. Immediately, Miller responded, and then Yelatontsev put his second 3-pointer in this game right into the basket, 53:55. When the Krasnoyarsk players began to score, Whaley stopped their run with a long shot. Bliznyuk also scored from afar, but the end of the quarter was ours: Cleveland finely finished a solo run, and in the final seconds Anton Kvitkovskikh prevented Sanders from scoring, picked up the ball and managed to put a hard ball into the basket – it’s just “–2” now, 64:66!
Loko decided to make full use of the initiative they had seized: Mikhail Vedischev scored from mid-range immediately after the game resumed, and then in three attacks in a row, our players scored 3-pointers: Cleveland, Vedischev and Kvitkovskikh. Misha got so excited that he even made a block shot – not something we see often from a 190-centimeter player!
After Miller scored our team’s 3000th point in the championship, the Krasnodar team took a double-digit lead – 82:71. Bliznyuk scored from beyond the arc, but Uzinsky did the same! Gerasimov made the last attempt to drag the game into a clutch with an accurate 3-pointer 52 seconds before the siren – 87:79. But instead of a slow game, a rapid exchange of highlights began: Kvitkovskikh assisted Whaley’s dunk, Zagretdinov responded with another slam dunk… There were no longer any serious doubts about Lokomotiv’s strong-willed victory.
Now Lokomotiv Kuban will have three home games in a row: on March 9 at 5 AM with Zenit, on March 12 at 8 AM with Samara and on March 16 at 2:30 AM with CSKA.
We are waiting for you in the stands of Basket Hall!