We knew they have a great team. They showed it last summer, they showed it yesterday against Finland,” Aleksander Balcerowski chipped in a conversation
with BasketNews. “We knew what players they have, what kind of basketball they play.”
However, the Panathinaikos AKTOR Athens center admitted that he did not expect the opponents to make so many threes. The Bahamas finished the game
making 13-of-29 threes (45%). In the first quarter alone, the Bahamas converted 6 3-pointers.
“In the first half, we were a little surprised about their field goal percentage from three. They made a lot
of shots, and it broke our rhythm a lot in the first half,” Balcerowski noted. “In the second half, we tried to come back, [but]
we didn’t do it. It was a close game. [We were down] by 6 points in the 4th quarter, but [we got] nothing [out of it].
Tomorrow, we have another game, which is win or go home.”
It was good,” Balcerowski put it shortly when asked what was it like to test himself against the Portland Trail Blazers big.
Contrary to Balcerowski, Sochan didn’t have a great start to the game. The San Antonio Spurs forward was pretty limited in the first half, finishing it with only 5 points.
Nevertheless, after the final buzzer, Sochan had 16 points (6/10 FG, 1/1 3PT, 3/4 FT), 10 rebounds, 3 assists, 1 block, 6 turnovers, and 19 EFF in 27 minutes of play.
It’s not always gonna be perfect. I just finding my moments, finding different cuts, and stuff,” Sochan responded about his much better performance in the second half.
Up next, Poland will face Finland in an elimination game scheduled for Thursday, July 4, at 20:30 CET.
