Granca devours Joventut in the second half

Gran Canaria continues in a great moment of form. After completing a wonderful first phase of the Eurocup, which will allow them to play until a hypothetical final with the home court factor in their favour, today they took a totally surpassed Joventut ahead after the break. The coral island triumph was decided in the third quarter against an impassive Penya, who also suffered the expulsion of Carles Duran.

Like a shot, never better said, the game began in Gran Canaria, accelerating from the starting grid hardly giving La Penya a break. Thus, the team still led by Victor García for that controversial sanction against Lakovic began with triples from Shurna, Brussino and Slaughter that very soon shot him on the scoreboard: 10-2. However, in the first corners the island team was already skidding. Although, consecutively, Shurna hit another triple and Slaughter was 2+1, barely winning out of seven: 16-9. By then I had entered Tomic to bring order, and a triple by Parra, his seventh point of the opening quarter (and of the first half), put the score in a fist: 18-17.

Between the last minutes of this period and the first of the next, Granca went downhill. Thus, hardly realizing it, incapable of finding answers to the multiple offensive variants of the youth, that nothing was left behind in the defense of his own basket, he conceded a partial of 5-18 that announced a storm: 25-35.

The local team barely found spaces in their once fluid attack, the yellow host so bogged down before the green-black palisade. So much so that Brussino, the main local offensive option, had barely shot once to the basket, that three-pointer at the start, before the two free throws that minimally cut the visitor’s advantage: 29-37. However, a tremendous Guy’s triple gave Penya the maximum income in their favor, 31-42, who also had the Happy state of grace, 15 points in a first part that closed 41-46 with the agonizing basket of Inglis, who reappeared after his double injury, knee and left ankle, suffered on March 11 in Granada.

The break could not sit better for Gran Canaria. Enraged, the local formation started with nine points on the pull between Slaughter and Brussino, 13 each at that time, to regain control of the game: 51-47. Since then, and little by little, Joventut has been sinking without any possibility of salvation. It happened that, only in the third quarter, the partial in favor of the island team was 32-12, 73-58 at the end of it, a real yellow hammer, also unleashed secondary actors such as Albicy and Salvó.

By la Penya, after passing through the changing rooms there was hardly any news from Parra, Tomic and Vives. The green-and-black team seemed to have completely disappeared when a very upset Carles Duran was sent off. Two triples by Bassas and Brussino seemed definitive, 85-71, but Joventut took advantage of what seemed like an attempt at local distraction to try to get back into the game, getting up 92-83 with a couple of minutes of play still to go.

However, five points from Shurna, already within the last 60 seconds, finished certifying a local victory that was not in greater danger in the second half either. Thus, Granca adds its 16th victory of the course, tying precisely with Penya herself, to which this course has won both games this season. Perhaps a third is missing. In any case, it would be wonderful news for Spanish basketball: the Eurocup semifinal. But that’s another story that, why not, has so many chances of being real that it’s hard not to imagine it.