Morabanc Andorra, 79-Alimerka Oviedo, 60
Rooms: 22-24; 15-15; 24-11; 18-10
Referees: Sandra Sánchez, Eric Carrera and Alejandro Benavente. no exclusions
Government Pavilion of Andorra La Vella: Good entry.
Andorra is too high for Alimerka Oviedo, who ended up losing clearly on their visit to the leader’s stadium, who remains undefeated at home. And that Trifón Poch’s team came out willing to reach the summit in what is perhaps the most complicated summit of the LEB Oro, but the one in charge there, Natxo Lezkano, who coached the OCB the past three seasons and who in the current one has Assuming the challenge of returning the Andorran team to the ACB, he was not willing to be surprised by an Oviedo team that, in any case, continues to show positive signs, also with a defeat that in the end was heavier (79-60) than expected. the party reflected. Although, the OCB suffered too much again when its starting five gave way to the bench men, with a lot of prominence for Chuso González, always very active and not always for the best. Despite the defeat, the Asturian team is still out of the relegation places.
The best of the OCB were the first bars of the first quarter, in which he played some of the best minutes he has played this season, with an inspired Peñarroya at the controls and with the quintet that all the OCB fans already know by heart – Peñarroya, Crouch, LeCesne, Pruitt and Oliver Arteaga–. For several minutes, Poch’s team gave the impression of going over what is so far the best team in the competition.
The staging was, above all, very serious, with a team that knew what they were playing for, that defended judiciously and that, this time, was successful outside, a circumstance that makes Alimerka Oviedo add many integers. Precisely a triple by Pruitt was the one that made the biggest difference for the visitors in the first quarter (8-20), when there were 3.48 left to finish. But the irruption of Felipe dos Anjos, a former OCB player, revived the Andorran team, which began to be much superior in rebounding and scoring easily under the basket. Lezkano, the current coach of Andorra, knew how to find the key and look for his rival’s weak points to stop the great start of the Asturian team.
The good work of the Asturian team continued in the second quarter, but the game was now more where Lezkano wanted than where Poch wanted. An imperial Dos Anjos dominated the inside game and rebounding problems once again hampered an OCB who was no longer scoring with as much joy as in the first quarter. Even so, the quality of players like LeCesne and, above all, Romeo Crouch allowed the Carbayón team to maintain a two-point lead (37-39) for the second half.
But that’s where it all ended. An 8-0 run from the start began to clarify things for a local team in which players of as high a level as Speight (another former OCB player), Rafa Luz (played for more than a decade in the ACB) or Schreiner (usual in the best teams in this category). Perhaps the OCB was weighed down by the stage and the rival’s talent and stopped playing with the self-confidence and seriousness of the first minutes. The game also entered a different phase, with more errors that revealed the rebounding problems of Trifón Poch’s team. An 11-point lead (61-50) for Andorra at home in the third quarter is practically insurmountable and, although the OCB never lost face in the game, everything fell under its own weight. More favorable battles will come for the OCB, especially at home, where they have to become strong if they want to distance themselves from the red zone.
