Red Star Falls to Zalgiris 77-83, Navaro's Euroleague Debut
Red Star lost 77-83 to Zalgiris in the first round of the Euroleague, in Ibon Navaro's debut on the bench. The coach says the team lacks a lot, but that there's room to progress.
Ibon Navaro walked into the mixed zone at Belgrade Arena for the first time as Red Star’s head coach, and for the first time he had to explain a loss by the red and whites. He didn’t look for excuses, and he didn’t look for a scapegoat in the locker room either.
We didn’t play our best basketball tonight. The start of the first and third quarters was very poor in terms of energy, concentration and our lack of control on the defensive boards. The ball movement was poor, there was too much dribbling, not enough passing, it wasn’t dynamic enough.
That was Navaro’s assessment of his first official game on Red Star’s bench, a Euroleague first round matchup against Zalgiris that slipped away from the home side in the final two minutes.
The game was messy from the start. Red Star lost the first quarter 21-28, as Zalgiris pulled ahead by as much as ten points early on, powered by Jonas Valanciunas and shooting from distance. Then came the turnaround. Chris Jones, who had scored 13 points in the first half, was joined by Semi Ojeleye, while Jared Butler hit three straight threes off the bench to put Red Star up 45-43 at halftime, after the team won the second quarter 24-15.
The second half started differently. Zalgiris opened it with a 7-0 run, Red Star went scoreless for more than three minutes, and the visitors took the third quarter 16-12 to lead 59-57 heading into the final period. The last quarter was the tightest and most nervous of the night, going 24-20 to the visitors, and, as Navaro himself said, the game was decided in the final two minutes.
The final score, 77-83 for Zalgiris, is confirmed by Danas, Kurir and Telegraf. Mondo listed a different score, 77-84, in the lead of its live coverage, but in the description of the final points it too settled on 77-83, matching everyone else.
Chris Jones was by far Red Star’s best player, with 15 points and eight assists. Butler and Kramer followed with 11 each, Jordan Nwora added 10, while Chima Moneke and Semi Ojeleye each scored nine. For Zalgiris, Williams-Goss was the most efficient with 14 points, Carsen Edwards and Valanciunas added 13 each, and Brown and Tubelis both finished in double figures with 10 apiece.
The biggest problem of the night was named Jonathan Motley. According to Arena Sport, the American posted the second-worst efficiency rating in Euroleague history on his Red Star debut, while Telegraf reports he committed four offensive fouls, one of which fouled him out on a technical late in the game. Navaro didn’t want to say much about him, but he did have one sentence that said it all.
Motley is the saddest man with this performance tonight.
Despite the loss, Navaro didn’t sound worried about the bigger picture. He repeated that this was only the first game in a system still being put together, and that the team has to accept mistakes while it finds its rhythm.
The good thing is that we have a lot of room to improve. We mustn’t rush, we have to make mistakes too so we can learn.
The game was played in front of a reduced crowd, since the Arena’s capacity, as this outlet reported ahead of the match, remained limited because of a Euroleague penalty. That didn’t help against history either. Zalgiris leads the head to head series 14-6 since 2000, and has won four of the last five meetings.
For a coach still putting his system together, this was a reminder that the work moves slower than the enthusiasm in the stands. The next test comes already in the following Euroleague round, when Red Star hosts Hapoel Tel Aviv in Belgrade.
