The army team parted with zero – Newspaper Kommersant No. 22 (7467) of 02/07/2023
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The winning streak of CSKA, which has not lost in the championship of the VTB United League for 24 matches, was interrupted on Monday in Moscow. The defending league champion Zenit, who won with a score of 90:86, stopped the army team.
The current season for CSKA is developing so successfully that even now it is possible to say with a high degree of probability that the army team will be the first in the regular season. It is not surprising, given that since the beginning of the season, that is, for 24 matches, Emil Rajkovic’s wards have not known defeat (this is a league record), and the closest pursuer, UNICS, was three wins behind at once. If we do not take into account the play-off meetings, and the final series of the last season for CSKA was unsuccessful, then it turns out that the army team did not lose a year in the regular season matches. The last defeat of CSKA at this stage was on February 7, 2022 in a crazy confrontation with the same UNICS. It took three overtimes to resolve the dispute.
However, even such a powerful dominance of CSKA during the tournament did not deprive, let’s say, of the weight of his confrontation with Zenit. Yes, the current champion this season is not as convincing as his main rival, yes, he has already accumulated seven defeats in his liabilities (two of them against CSKA, and the most recent one is dated January 20). But it is obvious that Javi Pascual’s team has not put their strongest trump cards on the table yet. And it would be reckless to form an opinion about how strong she really is based on the results of only the first stage of the regular season. By and large, Zenit is still in the protracted stage of searching for the optimal composition. Only in recent weeks, the team has replenished with two-time Euroleague champion in Anadolu Efes Adrien Moerman, Royce Hamm, who moved from the Belgian Championship, Trent Fraser, who moved to St. Petersburg from the Serbian Championship.
It was the above three that largely determined the game of Zenit in the first half of the confrontation with CSKA. The army team did not come up with something special, making a reliable bet on the talent of Nikola Milutinov, which has no equal in the game “in the paint” in the league. And Milutinov confirmed his effectiveness. But other CSKA players flared up only in episodes. This allowed Zenit not only to stay on a par with the hosts, but also due to long-range shots of the same Frazier (with 15 points in the asset, he became the most productive player of Zenit), Moerman, and Trey Tompkins in the moment even run ahead by nine points.
However, Zenit, and this has let the team down more than once during the season, still lacks game stability. And often the team, judging strictly by statistics, which has the best defense in the league, suddenly forgets about the game in defense and gives the enemy too many chances. So it was, by the way, in the January meeting with CSKA, when Zenit released Kasper Weir from custody for some minutes. Well, he gave four consecutive long-range hits that predetermined the outcome of the match. Something similar happened this time as well. With the difference that Zenit did not have any particular offender – the guests could not cope with the entire army team at once. And as a result, instead of a nine-point lead, they found a gap of 12 points on their account.
And here Xavi Pascual had to intervene in the game. The Spanish coach, one of the most emotional in the league, outdid himself here. Zenit players have probably not heard so many “kind” words for a long time. But Pascual achieved an educational effect. The guests’ defense started working again, and CSKA was forced to switch from team play to individual actions. Usually this mode does not become a problem for CSKA. But this time neither Aleksey Shved nor Ware, who usually act as the team’s jokers, differed in the accuracy of their attempts. But the guests scored their points. As a result, less than two minutes before the siren, Zenit led by eight points. In principle, this is a working gap and CSKA had a chance to eliminate it, but Zenit worked out the end of the match better. The guests won with a score of 90:86 and interrupted CSKA’s record winning streak.
VTB United League Championship. Second phase
CSKA – Zenit 86:90.
Leaderboard
Group A
I V P % of wins
1. CSKA 25 24 1 96
2. UNICS 24 21 3 88
3. Zenit 25 18 7 72
4. Lokomotiv Kuban 24 14 10 58
5. Paris Nizhny Novgorod 24 13 11 54
6. MBA 24 13 11 54
Group B
1. Parma-Pari 23 10 13 43
2. Samara 24 9 15 38
3. Avtodor 23 8 15 35
4. Enisey 24 8 16 33
5. Astana 24 5 19 21
6. Minsk 24 1 23 4
Points scored by teams in the first stage are taken into account. According to the results of the second stage, all six teams of group A and the two best teams of group B advance to the 1/4 finals.
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