Since all previous games in this semi-final series ended with the home team winning, Lokomotiv tried to turn the stands of the St. Petersburg’ Arena CSC into home stands, inviting as many of their fans there as possible – as a result, a decent sector gathered, plus people in red and green colors were visible here and there.
Lokomotiv started with several mistakes: there were two turnovers in a row, then Andrei Martyuk’s shot rolled and rolled along the arc, and jumped away. As it gradually became clear, misses from perfect positions, as well as from the free throw line, will haunt our team until the end.
Nevertheless, Loko became more active in defense, began to force the opponent to make mistakes – and after Tahjere McCall scored in his signature sprawling run, and Vladislav Yemchenko’s shot at the very end of the possession, the score levelled at 6:6.
It was noticeable that Javier Pascual’s main instruction to his team was to return to defense as fast as possible, so that Lokomotiv could attack not in quick transitions, but positionally. In this slow game, both sides scored few; of our players, only Kirill Yelatontsev felt more or less confident, and the quarter ended with a score of 14:17 in favor of Zenit.
Yelatontsev and Andrey Vorontsevich exchanged long-range shots at the start of the 2nd quarter – and the game suddenly opened up: there were still many misses on both sides, but the pace increased, there were more attempts, so the scoring increased too. Yelatontsev responded to Vince Hunter’s dunk with his own slam dunk, and then rushed into defense – and blocked Alexey Shved. Soon Antonius Cleveland from beyond the arc put Lokomotiv ahead for the first time this evening, 28:27.
The opponents began to take the lead in turns – by the end of the quarter the leader changed 7 times. Isaiah Whaley and Yemchenko scored good shots, the team defense made Dwayne Bacon, Zenit’s best scorer, to do several turnovers. But Cleveland got his third foul, McCall got hit in the nose and went to the bench to stop the bleeding, and Bacon scored a long shot with the buzzer, which allowed Zenit to take the lead and go into the big break, 37:38.
Martyuk scored twice at the start of the third quarter, but then our team play in attack have broken – and in defense too: Trent Frazier got open for a 3-pointer and was accurate, Hunter scored 2+1 in one attack, Bacon added 2 in the next, and after our timeout Frazier made another 3-pointer – so the gap became double-digit for the first time that evening, 41:52.
In the next attack, John Jenkins scored from the corner – however, it turned out to be a two-pointer. But Whaley started to bombard the hoop from the perimeter: his two 3-pointers made the score 50:59. But Bacon continued to score, and Cleveland and Whaley received their 4th foul each, at least the buzzer beater in this quarter was ours – Patrick Miller set the score to 52:63.
Whaley scored at the start of the 4th quarter, but almost immediately received an unnecessary foul, which forced him top be ejected. Lots of fouls slowed the pace of the game, and Lokomotiv began to gradually reduce the gap. Cleveland scored 2+1, making it 57:64. Bacon, however, made a long throw in response, but Miller and McCall, plus good defense, reduced the margin to “–5”.
But Frazier and Shved quickly scored two tough and courageous 3-pointers, and at this point our team suddenly ran out of both strength and focus. The final burst was Martyuk’s accurate free throws, after which the score became 71:81 with 2.30 left. And then our players began to rush into easy-to-read isolations, time after time getting blocked by Hunter (he ended up collecting as many as 6 of them), and the outcome of the game, alas, was no more in doubt.
Now our team is heading to Kazan, where the first two games of the bronze medal series will be held on May 26 and 28. This is the best-of-5 series, so for now we only sell tickets for one home game – May 31 at 2 PM. If the winner of this series is not determined in the first three games, then see you in Krasnodar at June 2. Game #5 is also possible – June 5 in Kazan.
Well, let’s fight for medals!