Loko’ roster for this game with quite the same as for Samara. Except, of course, for Patrick Miller and Antonius Cleveland, who will return into the lineup.
Let’s talk about the CSKA leaders in more detail.
Point guard Melo Trimble is the best on their team in three key stats: points (14.4), assists (3.8) and steals (1.7). He is also the one who gets fouled the most (5.3 on average per game), and he shoots three-pointers with an elite accuracy of 45.9%, scoring 2.3 out of 4.5 attempts.
Backup point guard Casper Ware is always ready to take control of the game. In his 21 minutes on the court, he scores 10.3 points, makes 3.3 assists and 0.7 steals, and his plus/minus is the best among CSKA backcourt players (10.8).
As for the backcourt of CSKA, the best plus/minus belongs to power forward Amate M’Baye (11.5). The Frenchman scores 10.5 points, including 41.8% of three-pointers (1.2 out of 2.8 attempts), makes 3.0 rebounds, 1.6 assists, 0.9 steals and 0.4 blocks.
Center Tonye Jekiri leads his team in rebounds – 5.2 is the 10th result in the league (our Isaiah Whaley makes the same number ). The army big man also averages 10.2 points and 0.8 steals per game.
Definitely worthy of a mention is shooting guard Aleksa Avramović with his 13.1 points, 3.3 assists and 1.4 steals.
In general, the game load in CSKA is evenly distributed between 10 players (of those we haven’t mentioned yet, these are center Livio Jean-Charles, power forwards Nikita Kurbanov and Semyon Antonov, small forward Anton Astapkovich and shooting guard Ivan Ukhov). It’s no coincidence that this team leads the league in assists. This makes them first in the championship in the accuracy of 2- and 3-pointers – they definitely know how to find good throws.
At the same time, out of the five defeats that CSKA suffered in the current championship, two were inflicted on them by Lokomotiv Kuban, and in very different styles: in December, our team showed a master class in defense (69:65), and in January – in attack (106:104). Also, in the first game (91:92), Isaiah Whaley was shooting the winning buzzer, but missed.
So we can expect a decent thriller and plenty of good moments from the game on March 16. When we published this preview, there were exactly 50 tickets left on sale: 39 for the upper tier, 9 for the lower tier, and 2 for the court. We are waiting for you at the Basket Hall!
Also, the game will be broadcasted live on the Match, Krasnodar and Start TV channels, as well as on the VTB United League and our club’s websites.
Go, Loko!