Pari Nizhny Novgorod defeated Avtodor on the road — 71:69 (20:17, 21:20, 18:9, 12:23).
The best scorers
Avtodor: Nikita Mikhailovskii (14 + 8 rebounds + 5 assists), Christian Jones (11 + 5 rebounds), Ryan Boatwright (10 + 5 assists), Brandon Garrett (8 + 10 rebounds)
Pari Nizhny Novgorod: Dragan Apic (16 + 7 rebounds), Jermaine Love (12), Vitali Liutych (10), Dmitry Khvostov (0 + 11 assists)
Game progress
The hosts started the Volga Durby better, Evgeniy Kolesnikov and Ryan Boatwright put Avtodor ahead. However, Nizhny Novgorod quickly got back — Dragan Apic scored six points in a row. The whole first quarter was wavey: lead was constantly shifting from one team to another. At the end of the starting quarter, Nizhny Novgorod shooters finally found their shot — Aleksandr Chadov and Vitali Liutych made shots allowed Pari NN to end the quarter wiht the lead – 20:17.
The second quarter started just as hard. Both teams were very active in defense: Nizhny Novgorod make the opponents to make turnovers and Avtodor had Evgeny Minchenko in the paint, who got 4 blocks in the first half. The end of the second quarter repeated the previous one, Avtodor took the lead, but Nizhny scored 5 points in the last minute and again ended the quarter as the leader.
Avtodor started second half bad. With turnovers and mistakes of the hosts, Nizhny Novgorod had a 8:0 run, at some point led by 14 points – 55:41. The two-digit difference remained by the beginning of the fourth qiarter.
The key moment
Despite a large number of turnovers (20) and not the best shots percentage, Avtodor largely due to a powerful defense managed to catch up with the guests and came back to the game in the end. Avtodor comeback with the score 69:61 began with a spectacular alley-oop by Brandon Garrett two minutes before the end of regulation. Almost immediately Nikita Mikhailovskii made Dmitriy Khvostov to get the fifth foul and then Nikola Rebic made his shot — 69:67. The Saratov team brought the ball to Aleksandr Petenev, who made a lay-up and forcing Zoran Lukic to take a timeout.
There were less than 10 seconds left until the end of the regulation. Pari NN quickly played a good combination: concentrating on protecting the perimeter, the Saratov team missed Aleksandr Gankevich. Avtodor still had a chance at least for overtime, but Christian Jones made a bad pass and Jermaine Love made a key steal, the Saratov team did not have enough time for a tactical foul. Zoran Lukic’s team wins the second game of the season.
Hero
Dragan Apic. The Serb finished the game almost without misses, making 8 of 12 shots from the game. Having scored 16 + 7 in just 21 minutes on the court, Apic became the best scoring player of the game.
Numbers
6 blocks by Evgeny Minchenko is a new career high for Avtodor center. The Saratov bigman made twice as many blocks in this game as all the other players of both teams combined.
What’s next
Avtodor: road game against Zenit on October 14
Pari Nizhny Novgorod: home game versus UNICS on October 13
