It’s pretty snowy in Perm these days, but the red-and-green fans still show up to rock the stands at the Molot Sports Palace. Max often supports us on long trips, and this time Misha from Kaliningrad joined him. Thanks, guys!
Ilya Popov immediately justified his appearance in the starting lineup: he stole the ball from Terrell Carter and scored with a foul, then soon forced Carter to get a second foul. Lokomotiv’s rebounding grit was soon showed by BJ Johnson, who’s leap reached the top of the backboard, making it 4:0. Jaylen Adams scored three points, but Anton Kvitkovskikh immediately responded with his 3-pointer. And that was the beginning of a different game, with plenty of close contact and misses. Only at the 6th minute Loko scored again – Jeremiah Martin made it 9:9. By the end of the quarter, Kirill Temirov (2+1) and Zakhar Vedishchev with a long-range buzzer-beater managed to score some more points for Loko, but BETCITY PARMA still was ahead, 15:17.
Early in the 2nd quarter, Mike Moore was set up for an open shot from two feet out with a great ball movement; a little later, Temirov broke through to the hoop, defying 3 guards. But Lokomotiv’s shooting percentage remained low, and BETCITY PARMA took an 8-point lead after a long-range shot by Victor Sanders – 21:29. After a Krasnodar team timeout, Temirov scored from the perimeter, Popov pushed Carter off the paint and also scored, Patrick Miller converted the layup but soon picked up his 3rd foul, but Carter also got his 3rd personal, and seconds later, Temirov and Kvitkovskikh executed a great one-timer in quick transition, cutting the gap to 30:31. Soon, Temirov tied the game with a long-range shot, but Gleb Firsov had a good run at the end of the quarter, giving the Perm team a 39:33 lead by the break.
As soon as the game resumed, Moore scored 3 points and almost immediately added 2 more. BETCITY PARMA quickly responded with 5 points in a row. Miller ignited Lokomotiv’s pursuit, successfully finishing two attacks in a row. Then Vince Hunter got involved: he scored and and made a steal, which allowed Moore to put Krasnodar ahead, 48:47. Martin soon increased our lead to 3 points, but it didn’t last long – frequent lead changes began, which continued almost until the end of the quarter. It was good that Loko’s percentage had risen significally: Popov made a great pass to an open Kvitkovskikh, Temirov not only scored but also forced Carter to draw his 4th personal foul, Kvitkovskikh dunked – that’s how the red-greens went into the final break with a slight advantage – 59:56.
Firsov opened the 4th quarter with a 2+1, but Popov immediately restored the lead to Lokomotiv, 61:59. Firsov scored two second-chance points, Brendan Adams hit a 3-pointer, and the hosts kept this distance for a while, until Stanislav Ilnitsky fouled Temirov on a long shot, and Kirill tied it at 66:66. However, BETCITY PARMA continued to grab rebounds off our backboard and began to hold a 3-point lead again, but Kvitkovskikh tied it again from afar, 77:77, with 4 minutes remaining.
At that point, Lokomotiv started to be great on defense: PARMA’s attack was stopped, Martin put us ahead with an isolation play, we stopped one more opponent’s attack – and Martin not only scored with a foul (82:77), but also took Carter out of the game for his 5th personal foul. Sanders brought his team 2 points from the free throw line, but Martin again made it “+5”. Jaylen Adams hit a difficult mid-range shot, Miller missed – but Hunter cleverly put himself in the way of Sanders for the offensive foul!
A few seconds later, Hunter himself committed an offensive foul. But Martin made another key play – a steal, after which Miller scored two points, 86:81 with 39 seconds left. And after a BETCITY PARMA timeout, Moore made a steal, and Martin sealed the final score of this difficult, but ultimately victorious, game.
Lokomotiv Kuban will play their next game at home on February 22 against CSKA. The starting time is quite unusual: 1:00 PM. See you at the Basket Hall!