Bertram Derthona gives way to Virtus Roma
VIRTUS ROMA – BERTRAM DERTHONA 103 – 88
(27-16, 51-50, 79-69)
VIRTUS ROMA: Roberts 24, Basile 2, Vedovato 4, Baldasso 8, Maresca 8, Landi 19, Benetti, Lucarelli 3, Donadoni ne, Thomas 35, Taddeo ne. All. Corbani
BERTRAM DERTHONA: Spanghero 12, Sorokas 15, Mei 10, Johnson 30, Quaglia 5, Garri 9, Divac ne, Stefanelli 5, Radonjic 2, Meluzzi. All. Pans
A particularly inspired Virtus Roma in attack imposes the second stop of the season on a tenacious but not always consistent Bertram Derthona in the defensive half of the field. Thomas, top scorer with 35 points, and Roberts (24, including the baskets in the decisive part) are the spearheads of an attack capable of disrupting the Lions' rearguard, who fought trying to stay in touch with the game until the middle of the fourth period, then failing to keep up the amazing Roman offensive pace.
The start of the race is Roman. Thomas scores 12 points in the first 10 minutes and leads his teammates up to 27-16 in the 10th minute; for Derthona it is Mei and Spanghero who stop the emergency, before the first technical break brings order to the Juventus house.
The second period opens with three consecutive baskets by Melvin Johnson from long range, while Sorokas makes it 39-33 in the 15th minute. Johnson again (18 at half-time) leads the game for Derthona, triggering an open challenge that closes the hole and brings Derthona down by just one point at half-time (51-50). At the start of the third quarter Bertram Derthona overtakes, again with Sorokas, but Roma leaves little space and, when the Juventus percentages from distance drop slightly, they sink for 79-69 in the 30th minute, driven by eight points from Landi.
The Bianconeri have the strength to mend the game again and, with triples from Stefanelli and Spanghero, they get back to 84-80 in the 35th minute, but Virtus' new break is the decisive one. Thomas and Baldasso, with two three-point baskets with a high difficulty coefficient, keep Derthona at a distance and, in fact, close the score of the match.
Lorenzo Pansa: “Roma scores 32 out of 41 two-pointers and that's not acceptable. It's not acceptable for the simple fact that we were the second defense to concede 72 points in the first three days. This means that in defense there wasn't enough intensity and solidity in one-on-one situations, we can't allow this. Offensively we played a very good game even if in some respects we weren't clean. We followed the pace that Rome wanted. To win away we need to get back to the solidity we had in the first three games. It's not something to achieve but something to do again."
