Sport Argentina wins the South American giants clash

Source:Fonte - Fiba posting by Maganews http:www.maganews.com.br

It was time for the South American giants, Argentina and Brazil, to meet in Turkey, and it was probably the most exciting game of the tournament so far as the Argentinians won 93-89, and advanced to the Quarter Finals where they will face Lithuania on Thursday

ISTANBUL – Both teams have met many times at regional and continental competitions, but at FIBA World Championships they have played only five times with Argentina winning four. Now they showed the world the quality of games that they always play. The game was balanced and fiery since the start, where both teams displayed an impressive shooting performance in the first quarter.Argentina rested their offense on the secure hands of Luis Scola while Carlos Delfino was on fire from three point range (3-3). Brazil was led by their backcourt of Marcelo Huertas and Leandrinho Barbosa who couldn’t find their post up players and had to shoot from the perimeter.

In the final quarter Leandro Barbosa came in hot with two straight three pointers, but an unlikely figure came back to tie it as Hernan Jasen responded to tie it at 72. The rest of the game was close where both teams didn’t want to give anything. Argentina was led by Luis Scola, who scored 6 points in a row and after a desperation three by Marcelo Huertas with 1.9 seconds (91-89), he sealed the game with two free throws with 1.2 seconds. Scola finished with 37 points, 22 of them in the second half while Carlos Delfino had 20 and Hernan Jasen 15. Brazil had Marcelo Huertas with 32 points, Leandrinho Barbosa with 20 and Tiago Splitter along with Marcelinho Machado 10 each.

Quotes:

Ruben Magnano (Brazil head coach): Congratulations to Argentina for the win, their hard work. I don’t want to say too many things because Marcelo has said just about everything. It was a kind of really bad luck to meet a really good team like Argentina at this stage of the championship and we are sad about the loss but we are really happy that our team worked really hard and tried to do their best.

Marcelo Huertas (Brazil guard): We knew it would be a big battle and a very physical one. It was surprisingly high-scoring. We thought both teams would come out and defend very hard, but we were making shots. It’s tough for us because we had a good game plan. They made us pay for our mistakes, small ones. We wanted to go further but unfortunately we lose in the round of 16 and that’s a big disappointment for us. It’s disappointing to lose at this stage of the competition because we played very well. We only lost to the USA by two points. No other team has done that. We had a strong tournament but we lost to a good team. We’re happy and sad at the same time.

Sergio Hernandez (Argentina head coach): We are very happy because everybody knows we had so much anxiety before the game. The game was really tough. It’s normal because both teams are great teams. They passed the ball very well off the pick-and-roll and we tried to contain that. In the second half they went to Tiago (Splitter) in the low post more. They played very well. I am sure with Ruben in the next four years Brazil will be one of the best teams in the world.
Luis Scola (Argentina forward): It was a great game. I wish we would have faced them later in the tournament. It was real close. Either team could have won. It came down to the little things.

Fonte - Fiba