Balkan overwhelms CSKA in Sofia, reaches semis

Balkan deservedly through to the semis

29-04-2008 22:20

With an excellent 68-82 away victory Balkan Botevgrad swept the quarterfinal series against CSKA Sofia 2-0 and qualified for the Bulgarian playoffs 2008 semifinals to play Levski (who also only needed two games in their series).

CSKA didn't have a great day at all, despite playing in their their own hall in the capital Sofia. They had lost the series opener in the small town of Botevgrad 82-69 and now wanted to take charge early on and make sure they will take it to a third game. But their chances of such success only looked alive in the first five minutes, when they led 10-4. From that moment on nothing in CSKA's offense worked, as they yet again struggled, playing without a true point guard. Hristo Nikolov, who has been trying to play at "point forward" recently, had a poor performance, as he dished out 9 assists, but also had 8 turnovers on the night. American shooting guard Josh Washington was even more unsuccessful whenever he was asked to organize the teams offense and it was truly a mess all the way from mid first quarter on to the very end of the game last night.

As a result of all that Balkan had an amazing 0-20 streak to lead 10-24 and held the 14 point advantage after 10 minutes of play - 12-26. Thanks mainly to their dynamic backcourt trio - Bosnian Pavle Boljkovac and young Bulgarian brothers Lubomir and Ivan Lilov - they ruthlessly capitalized on every single miss or turnover by their opponents and hit them on the fast break. Midway through the second quarter the visitors had already amassed a 20+ point lead - 18-39. It was only Washington that was hitting the target (for threes) on the other end, but he was also missing quite a few from long range. At halftime it was still 20 points in favor of visiting Balkan - 30-50.

On three occasions during the third quarter CSKA pulled the margin down to 14 points, but that was all they managed to do. With Balkan leading by 19 points heading into the final quarter (51-70), the hosts knew they were up against it, especially considering how poorly they had played on the night up to then. With a more-than-15-point advantage in the final few minutes, Balkan only needed to take the full 24 seconds for every attack to easily hold on for a 14 point winning margin. The latter is only academic though, since in the playoffs it is only the number of victories that counts.

Pavle Boljkovac had a game high of 28 points, as well as 6 assist, 6 steals and 5 rebounds in Balkan's victory. Washington led CSKA with his 23 points and 15 of those came from downtown, but he also had 7 misses from behind the arc.

FULL STATS OF THE CSKA - BALKAN GAME