Bourg-en-Bresse inflicted on Sunday the leader and defending champion Monaco, however deprived of Mike James and John Brown III, its second defeat in Elite basketball of the season (74-70), in front of its burning Ekinox audience on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the hall. What a long way we have come since January 24, 2014 and the inauguration of the enclosure with some 3,500 seats for a ProB match. The “Game” is now in the leading group of the championship, tied for second with Asvel (16 wins for 5 defeats, 3 wins from Monaco) before visiting it next Sunday.
She will present herself in the Lyon suburbs on a series of eight victories and in an almost irresistible dynamic since the beginning of December (only one defeat, in Europe). The Monegasque ogre paid the price, even if he had left his playing master and his defensive leader at home after a week with two Euroleague matches and before another shock in the championship, Tuesday against Asvel.
His first defeat in the championship for three months to the day (94-86 on November 4 in Nancy) was evident from the start of the match, poorly handled, where he suffered from the Bressanne defensive intensity (4 points scored only during of the first 8 minutes). In the end, ASM will have lost a whopping 21 balls and suffered inside the law of the duo of French pivots composed of Bodian Massa (14 pts) and Kevin Kokila (11), while the great hope Zaccharie Risacher remained silent for the first time this season.
It was precisely after a basket from Massa that the Bresse lead peaked (61-47), at the very beginning of the last quarter, before a hot shot from Jordan Loyd (16 pts) maintained the lead. hope of a Monegasque comeback (63-61, 34th). “We are very happy and proud, we had worked a lot on this match, we knew that Monaco was winnable if we played our game and worked as a team” declared Kokila at the microphone of Skweek, however aware that Monaco was not “not 100%”.
