Krka Shut Down Jaszberenyi On The Road

Edo Muric led KRKA Novo Mesto to the top of Group F with 17 points

KRKA Novo Mesto used some stifling defence as they cruised to a 58-41 win over Fortress Jaszberenyi that lifts them to 2-0 in EuroChallenge Group F.

The visitors led from start to finish, with the advantage in double figures from the mid-point of the second quarter as Fortress were permitted to make only 18 shots from the field all night while being harassed into 27 turnovers.

Mesto wasted little time in setting the tone as three-pointers from Edo Muric, Jasmin Hukic and Matej Rojc powered them into a 13-2 lead.

Hukic's dunk late in the first half made it 29-15 and it was already apparent that this was not going to be the hosts' night.

They had to content themselves to a handful of morale-boosting plays, chief among them a big three from Adam Szogi that cut the gap to 37-27 midway through the third period before Mesto replied with six in a row.

The visitors really piled it on at the start of the fourth quarter, with a 9-0 burst making it 56-31 on Zvonko Buljan's jump-shot before the starters hit the bench and Fortress made some small in-roads into a lead already well out of hand.

Muric led Mesto with 17 points while Rastko Dramicanin had 11 and Milos Markovic 10 with 10 rebounds for Fortress.

Quotes Fortress Jaszberenyi vs. Krka Novo Mesto

Krka Head Coach Aleksandar Dzikic:
"We are glad we played a EuroChallenge game in this small town and presented our basketball to a wider and newer audience. They said we played better defence than offence, but this is normal with the problems we have on the guard positions. The game itself was hard and the victory was not as easy as the result suggests. The home team were breathing down our necks most of the time. I wish them many good games."

Krka Player Matej Rojc:
"We played a hard-fought game, against a good team. After a long trip and back-to-back road games I am proud of how our team stuck together to win."

Jaszbereny Head Coach Sandor Foldi:
"If someone told me before the game that we could keep Krka Novo Mesto within 60 points, I would have signed that right away. However, I expected more from our offence. You have to get used to the aggressiveness on defence and avoid having 27 turnovers. You can't win games with this many turnovers. Unfortunately we could not make the three-pointers in the beginning and were not able to set tough screens to get open positions. We hope to provide better days to Hungarian basketball fans in the future."

Jaszbereny Player Gabor Soos:
"Today we saw the difference between a team like Krka Novo Mesto and us. However, I don't see any tragedy. Everyone offered their maximum. If we had provided a better shooting percentage, the difference could have been less than 10 points. Today we got off to a bad day. We are a small team who try themselves on the international stage."