Despite a 2:6 in the opening minutes, the start of the game can be considered a positive for Lokomotiv: Vince Hunter‘s 4 points, several Kirill Temirov‘s baskets, Vsevolod Ishchenko‘s effort, and Danil Sheyanov‘s strong performance off the bench gave us an 18:15 lead by the 8th minute. Makar Konovalov and Jeremiah Martin extended our lead further, but CSKA managed to tighten the gap slightly by the end of the quarter – to 23:17.
Mike Moore maintained Lokomotiv’s lead for a while with his mid- and long-range shots, but Nikita Kurbanov and Antonius Cleveland began actively chipping away at the deficit. Hunter scored twice, but Melo Trimble and Livio Jean-Charles gradually put the Moscow team ahead. Starting at 37:38, Krasnodar’s percentage lowered dramatically, and by the big break, the score had dwindled to 39:50.
Lokomotiv’s attempts to piece together their team play were rejected by their opponents’ strong defense. In the 3rd quarter, only Martin was able to get anything going, while CSKA continued to steadily increase its lead, finishing the third quarter with a score of 74:54.
Hunter‘s dunk at the start of the 4th quarter sparked a Lokomotiv counter-run, but it didn’t last long: Trimble and Ivan Ukhov punished our team time and again for their misses, and even bursts like Anton Kvitkovskikh‘s basket didn’t change things – the score quickly exceeded 20 points, and by the final buzzer it had reached 30.
Still, Zenit left us with a chance to overtake them by losing at home to Uralmash. To achieve that, Lokomotiv needs to win all their remaining games and hope that the St. Petersburg team loses at home both to CSKA and UNICS.
Go, Loko! We believe in the team!