Basketball: Bourg-en-Bresse dynamites Besiktas and joins Paris in the Eurocup final

Second 100% French European basketball final: Bourg-en-Bresse joined Paris in the Eurocup final by defeating Besiktas (89-63), after a one-sided last quarter, Wednesday in front of its excited audience during the decisive support match. After Nanterre's title against Chalon-sur-Saône in the final of the 2017 European Cup, Parisians and Bressans will face each other from Tuesday, again in a best-of-three series for a higher trophy and which will offer the winner an automatic place in the Euroleague, the queen of competitions, next season.

Bourg-en-Bresse will not have the home advantage, and it could regret it given the atmosphere at Ekinox (3,500 places), which accompanied this first qualification for a continental final all evening (for its fourth campaign) of a club with a rather modest budget (7.3 million euros), moved up to the first division in 2017. “We are in the final!”, intoned the room two minutes from the siren, once the game was over. the end of a one-sided last quarter (24-4), where the Turks lost their footing and their nerves during an electric match between the two teams.

Their Serbian coach Dusan Alimpijevic was sent off (36th) for two technical fouls in quick succession and three of their players did not finish the match: two after committing five fouls (Matthews and Simonovic), the first (Angel Delgado) after an altercation with Bodian Massa, which earned both players an exclusion (18th). Without its Dominican anchor, Besiktas ended up suffering inside against the impact of Maksim Salash in the third quarter.

The Belarusian, sent to the fire for almost the entire second half in the absence of Massa and with Kevin Kokila quickly penalized with four fouls, was almost unstoppable during this period where he compiled 12 points (19 in total).

He was the great architect of the highlight of the Bressans, who inflicted a 12 to 3 on the Turks to come away by eight lengths (63-55, 28th), a gap reduced to six units at the start of the last period. A final quarter where the “Game” dynamited the Turks from the start, too diminished, with winning shots (2/2 for Maxime Courby to break away 75-60, 35th) and capsized Ekinox.