Villeurbanne (AFP)
Asvel Lyon-Villeurbanne achieved the feat of winning 78 to 69 against Italian club Olimpia Milan in their hall at Astroballe in Villeurbanne on Friday during the 24th day of the Euroleague.
Villeurbanne, who equalizes his total of ten victories obtained last season, remains 14th in the standings but can still hope to join the fight for qualification in the play-off while the Olimpia, which puts an end to a series of six successes of rank, is always 3rd.
The Villeurbanne people struggled for a long time on long distance shots.
At halftime, the latter led 40-37, had a three-point success rate of 33% (1/3) against 50% for the Milanese (5/10).
But Asvel then managed to make the difference at the cost of a very good fourth quarter time gained 26-13 and a three-point address finally found notably under the leadership of William Howard (9 pts, 3/5 to three points), David Lighty (16 pts) and Norris Cole (12 pts).
Still led at the start of the last quarter (56-52), Villeurbanne managed to reverse the situation by taking the advantage five minutes from the end (63-62) widening the gap to 78-66.
Overall, Asvel, deprived of injured Charles Kahudi and Derrick Walton Jr, previously delivered a fairly decent match.
The Rhone, except on long distance shots, showed good efficiency on interior shots (71.1% on the match) under the impetus in particular of Guerschon Yabusele (14 points) or Mustapha Fall (12 points).
Milan, deprived of its leader Sergio Rodriguez, but led by Shavon Schields (18 points) and Zach Leday (14 points) may regret not having been able to capitalize on their ten-point lead in the 25th minute (49-39).
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