2024-04-07 20:32:20
“Rytas” withstood the onslaught of “7bet-Lietkabelis” from Panevėžys 113:100 (34:20, 35:26, 22:33, 22:21) at home and celebrated the fourth victory in a row in the Lithuanian Basketball League (Betsafe-LKL).
During the second half, G. Žibėnas’ students led 68:41 against the Panevėžys team, and during the first part of the meeting they scored a total of 69 points, but in the first half of the fourth quarter, the Aukštaitija club reduced the gap to just 2 points 96:94 and encroached on the victory.
However, the people of Vilnius withstood the rush of Nenad Čanaks’ students and in the championships of the Lithuanian basketball league “Betsafe-LKL” they beat the basketball players of “7bet-Lietkabelios” for the third time this season and the Lieuvas vice-champions continue to line up in the second position of the “Betsafe-LKL” standings.
“To be honest, it was one of the worse matches,” G. Žibėnas started the press conference. – In the first half of the match, we gained an advantage because we defended several times and were able to run into the attack and play our game.
We went into the second half very lazy and very selfish in attack, which surprised me because we’re not like that and we share the ball.
“7bet-Liektabelis” is a very competitive team, which did not want to lose for the second time in a row at the ASG arena with a huge margin, which was against the “Wolves” team. We knew they would respond.
Unfortunately, we didn’t touch the players during the long break. If in April we are like we were in the second half of the game … if it is not a signal to the players and they are not interested … someone has to tell them. And I say that because we performed very poorly.
(The performance) was somewhat reminiscent of the start of the third quarter of the KMT (semi-final), where we conceded cheap points, started to go one-on-one ourselves in attack. In this way, experienced teams return to the match. We had more players at the end of the game and that’s the only reason we won.”
Margiris Normantas played one of the best games this season (27 points, 3 assists, 3 assists, 29 assists) and made a significant contribution to the victory of the Vilnius team against the Aukštaitija team. What did G. Žibėnas miss the most on the pitch when M. Normantas was out of the rotation due to an injury?
“Leadership,” answered G. Žibėnas without thinking for long. – As for our other leaders, we very often react to failures in attack. We carry over (the negative – ed.) to another, and another, and another attack. And look – 5 attacks that affect your less successful episode in the attack. This is a very bad example.
Margiris is already at the age where he avoids such a thing. He is already a more serious player than he was three years ago. Today, he really pulled us through when we needed it. All of his outings have been good. He didn’t make any defensive mistakes tonight, there was support from the bench… we have to admit, we missed him that month. It’s nice to see the player recover.”
Tonight from 20:00 In Lithuanian time, the young basketball players of “Ryto” entered the finals of the FIBA Youth Champions League, who are fighting with the talents of Istanbul “Galatasaray” in Debrecen (Hungary), and G. Žibėnas said that he believes in the potential victory of the young talents and looked at the most interesting players of the system.
“I watched all the matches, except against the Promitheas team of Patras, because I knew that everything would be a “cash box” there.
We really like what we have – Gantas (Križanauskas), Ignas Urbonas often plays sports with us and Mantas Liutkevičius is a very pleasant surprise. He is an offensive player. A very interesting child. It is a growing and rare position in Lithuania. Let’s hope something comes out of it.
We really hope that they will be able to win and we are already on that match”, said the specialist.
– After 45 seconds of the third quarter, you asked for a one-minute break. Like a break should be a signal, but it didn’t work. How should the team be trained to wake up in those moments?– G. Žibėnas was asked.
– We have a lot of training and we will search. I don’t even know why we would waste a minute of timeout so early… how do the players not know that in modern basketball it is very easy to come back from a 23 point deficit?
I dare say – I didn’t control (the team) myself in the second half of the match. With the defensive attitude we had going into the second half of the game … and the game was not controlled offensively by our defenders. We have to share the responsibility. This is a serious signal for us, which is very timely.
Of course, a win is always better than a loss, but in the second half of the match we showed disrespect to ourselves.
– Can this disrespect bring about changes in the composition?
– Not really.
– Have you seen 69 points in the first part of the match in the context of European basketball?
– Not a very common thing. Such a thing is more popular than the Atlantic. It may seem like we just threw everything in, but far from it. We did a great job defensively. Of course, 46 points in the first part of the match may seem like a lot, but it is a well-known rule – the shorter the attacks, the more attacks will come from both teams.
In the first half of the game, we played “Ryto” basketball, but after that we went out on our own and took half a day off for the second game.
– What motivation can the players have after such a turbulent match against Panevėžys and after the mess that happened last time in Kaunas?
– I really hope that this second half of the match will shake up the players and we will prepare correctly during training.
I will admit that there are things that we as coaches could ask for more. We will work on that, because fouls are important in European basketball, their selection, when to do them, and when to avoid them. This is a huge part of the game. We don’t do that until April. I say this in an open text to the players.
We can press them, push them forward, we can punish them somewhere, but I think it’s old-fashioned. The players have to push themselves forward and behave much more intelligently and maturely in this place.
2024-04-07 20:32:20