Bahçeşehir College, which was undefeated from its first group in the FIBA Europe Cup and matched with Avtodor Saratov, Bakken Bears and London Lions in the second round, defeated the Danish representative Bakken Bears with an away score of 86-85 and made its mark in the quarter finals.
Langston Hall, Jamar Smith, Jamal Jones, Sam Dekker and Oguz Savas to fight the Red Dragons; the home team started with five of Ryan Evans, Darko Jukic, Jarred Ogungbemi-Jackson, Tylor Ongwae and Travis Taylor.
Bahçeşehir College started the game with the effective play of Jones and Smith and was ahead 7-3 in the first three minutes. In the middle of the quarter, neither team had much trouble in scoring and the last 3 minutes of the period were entered with 16-16. In the remaining part of the quarter, the equality was not broken and the first quarter of the match was tied 23-23.
While both teams started the second quarter with a bit of a weak attack, the home team applied for a time-out with 6 minutes and 36 seconds before the end of the half, when the score was 31-25 with two threes in a row that Bahçeşehir College found from Berkay and Kartal. Continuing their fluidity with Dekker after the break, the Red Dragons were ahead 36-30 in the score and took a time-out with 4 minutes 41 seconds left in the first half. Even though Bakken Bears came back well after the break, Bahçeşehir College played well in the last part of the half and went ahead 46-40 to the locker room.
While both teams started the second half in a balanced way, the first three and a half minutes passed with the superiority of Bahçeşehir College 50-46. The score came to 51-52 with a 5-0 series that the home team caught quickly in the middle of the quarter, and the Red Dragons applied for a time-out with 5 minutes and 26 seconds before the end of the period. Coming back from the break with the hits from Solomon’s hand, Bahçeşehir College was ahead 59-51 in the last three and a half minutes of the quarter. In the last part of the period, both teams were trying to score with outside shots, and the last quarter of the match was entered with the superiority of Bahçeşehir College 66-60.
Both teams started the last period of the match 5-5, and the first three and a half minutes were led by the 71-65 Red Dragons. Bakken Bears applied for a time-out when the score was 73-65 in the last 5 minutes and 30 seconds of the match. Even though the home team tried to close the gap in the last part of the fight, Bahçeşehir College did not make any mistakes and left the field with a score of 86-85 and made its name in the quarter finals.
After the fight, Bahçeşehir College Head Coach Erhan Ernak made the following statements: ”It was a very critical match for both teams to stay in the top eight. We knew it would be a tough away game. Although we could not reflect everything we wanted on the field in terms of basketball, we are very happy to have won from here. We would like to thank our Turkish audience who supported us here.”
The Red Dragons, who left with four wins from the five matches they played in the second round, will host Avtodor Saratov, whom they lost in the first match on Wednesday, February 9, in the last match of the group, at Ülker Sports and Event Hall, and if they win the match by 6 points or more, they will advance to the quarter finals in the “group” group. He will qualify to be promoted as a ‘leader’.
