The Alba Berlin fan block traditionally celebrates the last home game of the year under the motto “Into the new year in style”. Instead of wearing a yellow and blue jersey, many fans come with a shirt and tie or in a smart dress. In terms of sport, it only worked to a limited extent with the style on Tuesday evening. Alba won in front of 10,881 spectators in the Bundesliga in a sovereign manner against the Central German BC with 86:60 (16:15, 21:14, 26:20, 23:11), but the performance of the German champions was not nice for a long time.
In the current phase with high stress, an international series of defeats and a persistent wave of colds, the B grade is not particularly important for the Berliners at the moment – and the result was right. In the BBL, Alba remains at the top with ten wins and only one defeat together with the Baskets Bonn.
On Friday (8 p.m., Magentasport), the Berliners then have the chance to finally end the negative series in the Euroleague, which has been going on for twelve games, in the last appearance of the year at Asvel Villeurbanne.
Personally, there was no good news for the Berliners after the annoying defeat against Maccabi Tel Aviv shortly before Christmas. Ben Lammers continued to miss out ill and now Captain Luke Sikma had it too. The long-term injured Marcus Eriksson was also missing.
The MBC had won three of the last four games and benefited greatly from the extensive experience in the squad. Tremmell Darden showed in the first quarter that despite his 41 years he can still be a good BBL pro. First he blocked a three by Malte Delow and then completed the subsequent fast break himself. John Bryant has been moving in slow motion in the center position for years, but he does it quite effectively thanks to his high basketball IQ.
In the early stages of the game, there was no discernible class difference between the series champions and the MBC, who mostly struggled against relegation. However, that also had a lot to do with Alba, because the Berliners made a lot of concentration errors. In the first quarter alone, they gave away the ball five times and the three-point quota was also weak. Alba didn’t get into the rhythm for a long time and the MBC repeatedly scored easy points.
Especially Kris Clyburn, the younger brother of Euroleague star Will Clyburn, often guessed the Berlin pass routes and was happy about spaces in the fast break. When he crashed the ball over Louis Olinde after the next Alba loss of possession, the MBC bench jumped up and Israel Gonzalez took a time-out. The Berlin coach couldn’t be satisfied with his team’s performance, but that changed before the break.
In the last minute and a half of the second period, Alba put on a 10-0 run that bore Johannes Thiemann’s signature. The international scored six points himself and served Louis Olinde the final dunk on a silver platter. Despite a very mixed performance, the Berliners went into the second half with an eight-point lead.
Alba took the security from this intermediate sprint into the second half. It was still not thrilling what the hosts played, but they now had the action under control. In the middle of the third quarter, the lead was in double digits for the first time and then grew to 26 points. At least that’s how it was stylistically correct in the second half.
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