Zenit won on the second try
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St. Petersburg Zenit for the first time in its history became the owner Russian Basketball Cup. In the decisive match, which, like the entire Final Four, took place in Yekaterinburg, Javi Pascual’s team beat Nizhny Novgorod with a score of 64:55. Thus, the St. Petersburg team got even with the Nizhny Novgorod team for their defeat in the final of last season.
The last edition of the Russian Cup, held by the Russian Basketball Federation, was already the 23rd in a row. In total, 37 teams competed in it, with 69 matches taking place. Of these, eight represented the VTB United League, thirteen represented the Super League, seven represented the Major League, and another nine teams were youth divisions of professional clubs or even amateur teams.
As you can see, not all of the 12 Russian clubs included in the VTB United League took part in the Russian Cup. Such giants as CSKA and UNICS also refused. This was largely due to the peculiarities of the regulations of the cup tournament. It allows only two foreigners to participate in matches (Belarusian basketball players are not considered such), and top teams often rely on foreigners.
However, two more big Russian clubs – Zenit and Lokomotiv-Kuban (the champion of the year before and the vice-champion of last season, respectively) – entered the Russian Cup. And if the Krasnodar team nevertheless stumbled in the quarterfinals, then Zenit went to the end, reaching first the “Final Four” of the Winline Russian Cup, and then the main match of the decisive stage.
In addition to Zenit, Nizhny Novgorod, Uralmash and MBA also made it to the Final Four, which was hosted by Yekaterinburg for the third time. That is, exclusively representatives of the VTB United League.
And it seems logical: after all, these are representatives of the top division. But in fact, this was only the second time when both semi-finals of the Russian Cup were played exclusively by teams from the VTB United League. The first one was recorded ten years ago!
On Friday when semi-finals took place, it turned out that the decisive match would take place without the home team – Uralmash lost heavily to Zenit. In another match, Nizhny Novgorod beat MBA. However, on Sunday the Ural team still received the award – in the bronze medal match it was stronger than MBA (82:70).
As for the final, here, oddly enough, Zenit could not be considered the undisputed favorite.
Yes, in the regular season of the VTB United League, St. Petersburg are third in Group A and have a chance to rise higher, while Nizhny Novgorod takes penultimate place in Group B. But, firstly, this season Zoran Lukic’s charges have already beat Zenit. Secondly, for Nizhny Novgorod residents, restrictions on the use of legionnaires were not something unusual. Zoran Lukic, who is also the head coach of the Russian national team, uses foreign players very sparingly, so in Yekaterinburg the team played as usual.
But Javi Pascual had to limit his available set of foreign players to the services of Trent Fraser and Vince Hunter. So the Spaniard even said that it was the Nizhny Novgorod team, and not his team, that were the favorites. Well, one more thing: last season Zenit met Nizhny Novgorod in the final (seven people remained on the team from last season). And in St. Petersburg. And he gave in. So it was difficult to suspect Javi Pascual of being poor.
The match really turned out to be difficult for both teams. Perhaps, if not for the sudden decline of the Nizhny Novgorod team, who missed the opponent’s 14:0 spurt, the game would have gone according to a different scenario.
Well, Zenit, having gained a quite comfortable advantage, switched to defensive play mode, which the team knows how to do very well. Plus, Trent Fraser found an interesting approach to playing in attack. He actually played a very interesting match. Frazier, who eventually became the Finals MVP, hit only one field goal. But he was fouled so often that he scored 15 of the 18 points recorded in his account (this is the best indicator of the match) from the free throw line!
The Nizhny Novgorod residents, however, fought to the end. There was even a moment when only five points remained from Zenit’s advantage through the efforts of Dmitry Khvostov and Alexander Gankevich. But Nizhny Novgorod failed to turn the tide of the game. Zenit turned on at the right moments, kept the opponent at a distance and brought the match to victory with a score of 64:55. The victory, in general, is historical. After all, Zenit won the Russian Cup for the first time. Let us add that for the St. Petersburgers this is already the second trophy this season – in September last year they conquered VTB United League Super Cup.
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