RSV Lahn-Dill defy their difficult circumstances
RSV Lahn-Dill chalked up a mentally important win against the Goldmann Dolphins Trier on their fourth game day. It was a heated game in which the Middle Hesse team kept their cool leading the team to a deserved 95:73 in this away match.
The team was considerably weakened before the game, when Center Dirk Koehler had to give notice that he was not going to be able to play due to health reasons, and it became clear, that Coach Nicolai Zeltinger was going to travel with only eight players, as David Amend, Christopher Huber, and Marco Zwerger were already playing at the same time in the top match of the second division RSV II against 1. FC Kaiserslautern. And exactly these worrying preconditions were supposed to unsettle the Wetzlar squad in the first minutes of the game.
Despite a fast start with 7:0 (2nd min) and 20:10 (8th min) the success became clouded when of all players the only two remaining Centers Joe Bestwick (8th min) and Felix Schell (12th min) cashed in very early sets of three fouls. These circumstances limited the German Champions a lot in their options to tactically change the team, which left the Coaches Nicolai Zeltinger and Ralf Neumann with not a lot of alternatives except to a physically a smaller formation of 13,0 points on the court as opposed to the allowed 14,5.
But exactly those players were on fire this Saturday and displayed an amazing offence, hitting the basket from everywhere. Especially Captain Michael Paye, and national players Thomas Boehme and Jan Haller, managed to fill those noticeable gaps in the formation with an awesome hit rate beyond eighty per cent. The viewers had an exciting game to watch, most of all when birthday boy Dirk Passiwan, who was celebrating his 36th birthday, tightened the game just before half time when he scored eight points in only 120 seconds and therefore lead his Dolphins to within reach of RSV.
They kept the trend up after half time, breaking their guest’s once comfortable lead (47:29, 18th min) down to a 55:47 (22nd min), whilst the RSV players all step by step kept collecting fouls. But despite the dangerous situation the European Champions proved to have nerves of steel on court and mastered teetering on a knife edge. Working cleverly and hard-nosed the RSV found holes in the Dolphin’s defence and succeeded to calm the game down for themselves, leading the game via 63:49 (25th min) and 74:57 (29th min) to a more comfortable point difference. In the 36th minute RSV sadly had four players on four fouls , but 29 seconds before the final whistle Dirk Passiwan joined them, ending a day’s work early as the only Dolphin with an overdrawn foul-account.
“This is an emotionally massively important win for us, most of all considering the upcoming top home game next Saturday against Zwickau.” Headcoach Nicolai Zeltinger was happy after this nerve-wracking but successful match, acknowledging the fact that the team still has to work very hard this week to prepare. This coming Saturday RSV Lahn-Dill are looking forward to hosting an exciting top game at 19.30 in August-Bebel-Sporthalle against last season’s runners up Zwickau.
Trier: Dirk Passiwan (32/1 Dreier), Kim Robins (23), Brad Baugh (8), Tyler Saunders (6), Hugh Anderson (2), Chad Jassman (2), Florian Ewertz, Dirk Schmitz (n.e.), Joao do Nascimento (n.e.).
Lahn-Dill: Michael Paye (31/1), Thomas Böhme (23), Jan Haller (17), Joe Bestwick (11), Felix Schell (5), Thomas Gundert (4), Gesche Schünemann (4), Björn Lohmann.