Bayern battle to an 81–75 win over Paris

This was not for the faint of heart: in a wild duel with French champions Paris, marked by mistakes on both sides, Bayern’s basketball team forced an 81–75 (34–31) win through sheer effort. For Svetislav Pesic’s team, it was their 11th win of the season and their third in a row. In front of 10,600 fans at the SAP Garden, the once again shorthanded German champions wore down the visitors in the final quarter. Offensively, the outstanding top scorer Obst (26) led the way, with Jessup (15) and Gabriel (14) also standing out.

In less than 48 hours, the Munich side will have another chance to add a win at the SAP Garden (Thu., 8:30 p.m.) against last year’s EuroLeague finalist AS Monaco featuring Daniel Theis, who lost on Tuesday at Kaunas.

Full Boxscore

Thursday vs. Theis and Monaco

Bayern had to do without their ill captain Lucic once again and Neno Dimitrijevic (still catching up in training), both of whom played major roles recently in Tel Aviv. Da Silva and Hollatz slotted into the starting five. Jessup’s and-one for 13–12 sparked the most productive stretch of the first quarter; threes by Giffey and Mike for 21–15 reflected a good balance between inside and outside (8’).

Paris pushed the pace in their trademark unconventional style but were still not scoring freely; Bayern ran with them, yet more than once waited in vain for a whistle and for the right touch on their shots. The 29–21 lead (16’) wasn’t extended— a dozen turnovers and 3-of-17 from three weren’t enough to do it.

Two Obst threes make it 77–69

The offense remained hard work in the third quarter, but Gabriel did well around the rim (46–44/27’). Triples from Giffey and Mike promisingly moved it to 52–46, and the hard-fought 60–51 even more so (33’). Fewer mistakes and a bit more rhythm than the opponent—Bayern now forced that with passionate defense and an edge on the boards (47–36).

Voigtmann’s quarterback pass to Jessup, Obst’s tireless mileage, and his two rainbow threes for 77–69 (–1:49) brought the fans to their feet. A block by Mike against Hifi and Obst’s free throws sealed the valuable grind-it-out win.

The quotes: 

Svetislav Pesic, Head Coach FC Bayern Basketball: “I’m truly very proud of the team, because we have so many problems right now—every game two or three important players are missing. Even so, we had continuity on defense, which helped us a lot. We weren’t successful for long stretches on offense, but we invested so much in defense, with fight and rotation. They’re the best offensive team and, together with Valencia, the best in transition, but we took that away from them with our defense. At the end we couldn’t stop Hifi a few times, but no one can when he’s in rhythm. The guys never lost concentration and kept their composure. It certainly wasn’t our best game, but the way we won makes me happy. (…) We recorded 25 assists against such an aggressive defense.”

Andreas Obst: “It was a really intense game—Paris always plays very fast and is very transition-oriented. You have to be alert every second, after every basket or lost rebound. They played very aggressively and we made a lot of mistakes, but we stuck together as a team, moved the ball, created open shots, and I’m very happy for the team that we won this game.”

Justinian Jessup: “It was a wild game, but in the end our defense won it today. The game was very intense; they play so fast that you get tired quickly. Our goal is always to win the next game—that’s what we focus on. We don’t need to look at the standings; we’ll enjoy this today and tomorrow we’ll focus on the tough game against Monaco on Thursday. Our confidence is growing from win to win, and we’re bonding more and more as a team.”

Niels Giffey: “It really wasn’t a pretty game, but it had an incredible amount of pace. In character it was more a Paris game than our game, but you can hardly play any other way against them. You have to fully attack their defense—there’s no other way. The initial adjustment phase with the new coach is now over; we understand what the coach wants and can adapt better.”