Barça licked its wounds in the classic and debuted its record of victories in the Euroleague. But what seemed like a most comfortable and convincing victory ended up becoming supine suffering until the horn sounded in a Palau with a sinking heart after a few last minutes of their team that do not have much explanation.
Jasikevicius's team will have to do a great mental job and value the first 36 minutes of the game, in which they dried Real Madrid with a defensive exercise to remember. As superb as it was terrifying was his final stretch, in which he resigned from the duel, allowing Deck to dress up as Michael Jordan and score all the points for his team in those last four minutes, drawing a 2-13 run that left the game in the air. Barça win. Not until the hoop repelled Llull's last triple did he breathe easy, not even the last brick of the Palau.
Barça showed its best and its worst face, which is leading it down the street of irregularity at the beginning of the course and showing that there is still a long way to go to glory. Mirotic's return, when it comes, will be heavenly music for a team unsuccessfully searching for a leader on the track.
The classic began playing on the board, with Chus Mateo hiding Tavares from the start and betting on the defense in a natural position, leading to a pairing between Satoransky and Sergio Rodríguez that the Czech knew how to take advantage of perfectly. The difference in size began to stain the Barça scoreboard with seven points from Satoransky almost in a row, in his best minutes so far as a Barça player. Madrid did not offer too much resistance, who saw how a triple by Kalinic put the ten point difference on the scoreboard of a boisterous Palau (16-6). Mateo was forced to stop the game and digest the first crochet of the night. More would come and he would rise above almost everyone.
The differences were stopped but they did not diminish in excess either and the game was played as Barça wanted. Without running too much and with a suffocating defense that slowed Madrid's offensive production. The duel between Kalinic and Deck in the paint was the most exciting, capable of lighting a fire in the North Pole. Vesely's wrist kept targets at bay, manufacturing points from mid-range shots with astonishing ease. Barça tried to press the accelerator before going to the changing rooms and with a basket by Sanli he made his fans burst with joy (40-27, m19) but a three-pointer over the buzzer by Hezonja from almost eight meters stopped the Barça momentum suddenly and kept their backs up for the second half.
But Barça was not intimidated, much more in need of happiness than its rival, as reflected on the parquet. The Jokubaitis-Vesely connection put on the show and only Hezonja put up something of a face. He stretched the Lithuanian to 61-43 but there was still a lot of night left. The azulgrana controlled the times in the last act until 73-60 with just over four minutes to go. Then Deck got bigger and Barça got smaller, Laprovittola terrible losing balls. But Llull's three-pointer didn't go in and the win was for Barça. And what a triumph.
75- Barça (24 16 23 12): Satoransky (12), Laprovittola (8), Kalinic (7), Tobey (8), Sanli (14) -initial team-, Da Silva (2), Paulí (-), Vesely (13), Abrines (1), Higgins (2), Jokubaitis (8) and Nnaji (-).
73- Real Madrid (15 15 22 21): Rodriguez (-), Hezonja (9), Deck (21), Yabusele (7), Cornelie (12) - starting team - Causeur (5), Abalde (-), Poirier (2), Tavares (6), Llull (6), Ndiaye (-) and Musa (5).
Referees: Borys Ryzhyk (UCR), Olegs Latisevs (LET) and Milan Nedovic (SLO). Without eliminated.
Incidents: match of the second day of the Euroleague played at the Palau Blaugrana in Barcelona before 7,511 spectators.
