In the Game of the Week, UNICS will host Lokomotiv Kuban.
Place: Russia, Kazan, Basket Hall
Time: October 23, 2022, 16:00 (Moscow time)
Broadcast: Match TV, League Website
The Rivalry
Lokomotiv-Kuban and UNICS played 36 games in the VTB League. The number of wins is equal: 18-18.
The Krasnodar team made its debut in the League in the 2011/12 season and immediately reached the Final Four, beating Zalgiris and Spartak St. Petersburg in the playoffs. In the semifinal against UNICS, Loko was in the lead before the 4th quarter and even had a laed 6.4 seconds before the end. The Kazan team were saved thanks to Henry Domercant shot 87:86 and reached the final.
It was the first Loko and UNICS game in the United League. Artem Zabelin who now plays for UNICS played for the Krasnodar team, as well as Samara basketball players Maksim Sheleketo and KC Rivers. UNICS head coach was Evgeny Pashutin.
Loko and UNICS met in the last two playoff draws – and the Kazan team won. In 2021, UNICS stopped the Loko in the semi-final (3-0) and in the 2021/22 season beat Loko in the 3rd place series (3-1).
Off-season work
When building rosters this summer, the teams went different ways. UNICS announced the continuation of Velimir Perasovic coaching, after the team signed 12 new players. Among the newcomers, it is worth highlighting ex-Zenit center Jalen Reynolds, Daryl Macon and the guard of the Northern Macedonia national team Nenad Dimitrijevic.
Loko chose to focus on youth. Andrey Martiuk, Aleksandr Shcherbenev, Vladislav Emchenko and Zakhar Vedishchev took the first roles in the team. The Krasnodar team also have three foreign players: Jaylen Barford extended his deal with the club, Darral Willis previously played for Pari NN and Enisey and Ivan Paunic. And the team is led by Alexander Sekulic, who led the Slovenian national team to the semifinals of the Tokyo Olympics a year ago.
Season Start
The start of the season showed that Lokomotiv Kuban needs to get used to the changes. In the first game, the Krasnodar team unexpectedly lost to MBA, the newcomer of the League, and then with great difficulty beat Samara. This was followed by a home loss from CSKA, but in Perm Loko has already shown from the best side: Martiuk set a season and career high in rebounds (14), Shcherbenev became the best in assists (9), and Vedishchev became hero of the game, turning the game into overtime and scoring it has the most important points.
As for UNICS, everything is much more stable here. Velimir Perasovic team has won 4 games – against Zenit, Enisey, Pari NN and Astana and came as the leader of the standings. The Kazan team showed that they know how to hold the ball and choose the right offensive moments, which is proved by stats.
Numbers and Heroes
UNICS (4-0) is the leader of the season, ahead of CSKA in the standings by the +/- difference. Loko (2-2) rose to the 7th place and if the team can improve its tournament place.
UNICS is in first place in shots percentage (54.5%), steals (11.8) and commits the least losses (10.8). Kazan is just a little behind CSKA in points per game scored(92.5 points) and is in the Top 3 in three-point percentage (43.4%). At the same time, despite a fairly powerful front line (Reynolds, Vince Hunter, Andrey Vorontsevich, Louis Labeyrie), UNICS (32.8) is only on the 10th line in rebounds.
But Loko is in 3rd place in the League in rebounds (38.3), as well as in steals (10.5). According to other stats, Loko moved away from the leaders: seventh in points (77.0), eighth in assists (16.5), fifth in turnovers (15.0) and shots percentage (39.9%).
As for the personalities, then UNICS should single out several performers. Firstly, Jalen Reynolds: the center is third in points, 17.5 points with 61% of hits from the game. Unlike playing for Zenit, now Jalen is dangerous even from the perimeter: he makes 3.8 three-points per game and scores more than half of them (53.3%)!
In the absence of injured Macon, Nenad Dimitrijevic became the main playmaker of the team. The Macedonian is second in the League in assists per game (8.0), while he makes an average of 2.3 assists. But, importantly, Dimitrijevic can not only pass, but also score and the guard is incredibly stable: 58.8% from the game, 40% from the three-pointer, 90.9% from the free-throw.
Georgiy Zhbanov made a huge step up in his development. If in the previous two seasons he did not score even 3 points per game, now he is sixth in the Kazan team with 7.5 points. Interestingly, being only the ninth tallest player in UNICS, the guard leads in rebounds – 5.5 per game in 22 minutes on the floor.
Loko clear leader is Jaylen Barford. The American, who moved to Krasnodar from Astana last winter, is first in the League in points (19.3) and steals (3.5), second in Loko in assists (4.5) and fourth in rebounds (3.8).
But, of course, the Krasnodar team game is not depend on the guard. Andrey Martiuk plays a huge role in it, who has already stated that he intends to defend the title of the League best young player. In the game with PARMA-PARI, the forward had a double-double (17 + 14 rebounds), with 6 offensive rebounds. It is worth looking at Aleksandr Shcherbenev, the main guard of the team. Anton Kvitkovskikh, a 21-year-old former Avtodor forward is gradually finding himself in the new team, who has the best percentage of shots from the game in Loko (54.2%).
Old Friends
In the offseason, former Loko captain Stanislav Ilnitskiy, who has played there for the past five seasons moved to UNICS. And forward Dmitriy Uzinskii, who has been playing for UNICS for the last three years, went from Kazan to Krasnodar.
Artem Zabelin (2011/12) previously played for Loko. The center crossed paths with Loko newcomer Anton Kvitkovskikh in Avtodor (2017-19) and with Dmitriy Uzinskii at Spartak Primorye (2012/13).
