Marne-la-Vallée (France) (AFP)

Very solid defensively, applied and offensively successful, with a great rotation to rest the workforce: Villeurbanne set the record straight on Saturday by crushing Boulogne-Levallois (88-59) and will try to win its first Leaders Cup Sunday against Dijon to Marne-la-Vallée.

By leaving the Metropolitan 92 of Boulogne-Levallois, yet the best attack in the French championship (90 points on average), at 59 points, Villeurbanne built its success in the semi-final of the Leaders Cup on its defense.

"Somewhere, we had a revenge against last week's game. We win with the way, it's good," said Asvel captain Charles Kahudi, who was able to play his second game (thirteen minutes of play) after being sidelined for a month due to an ankle injury.

The last ten days have been hectic for the Rhodaniens, between a new defeat in Euroleague and two consecutive losses in Elite, at home against Boulogne-Levallois (79-69) and Chalon-sur-Saône (99-96 ap) who lost the championship lead.

In addition, Edwin Jackson's moods in Le Progrès (criticism of his short playing time and the weakness of Asvel's collective play) caused a stir and the club first dismissed and then loaned the player at Estudiantes Madrid (1st div.).

The answer came on the floor of the Disney Events Arena in Marne-la-Vallée, first on Friday in quarters against a Strasbourg team in the midst of a crisis (a victory in 16 games), but especially on Saturday against Boulogne-Levallois, with an offensive game well in place.

"I always said that the defense brings easy baskets in attack. It was one of our strengths for a long time, then we were a little dull and we had more trouble developing this rhythm," added Kahudi.

- Alley-oop with Solomon's buzzer -

In this dense competition (three matches in three days), coach Zvezdan Mitrovic was able to rotate his squad, each player having at least a quarter of an hour of play (except Antoine Diot at eight minutes), with a beautiful performance by Belgian Ismael Bako (15 points in 20 minutes).

"We have proven that, even if there are things happening, we remain professionals, and when there are important matches we are present. We can win a first title and it can be good after all this happened, said Bako (24).

In the final, the Asvel will pass a final test to confirm its return in great shape, because it is the elite coleader, Dijon, which awaits it on the last step before a first coronation at Disney (the Asvel won in 2010 the Ace Week, predecessor of the Leaders Cup).

In the semifinals, Dijon signed their 14th consecutive victory on the national level, by knocking down Monaco, unbeaten at Disney, in the shock of the Elite coleaders.

In a very close encounter, the Monegasques thought they had done the hardest by equalizing 6/10 of a second from the end by Norris Cole (81-81), but on the next throw-in, Richard Solomon scored an alley-oop of anthology on a pass from Axel Julien (83-81) to offer Dijon a first final of the Leaders Cup.

"This is our first final, it's historic for the club, we will try to play it thoroughly. We were new tonight. Tomorrow they will be 11 or 12. It can be physically complicated, but when we win like that , we can find the necessary resources, "hoped Dijon winger Jérémy Leloup.

© 2020 AFP