68:33-win over still unsuccessful Hannover United
Top-of-the-table team RSV Lahn-Dill have won their eighth game of the season as well. The team was able to maintain their spot at the top with their 68:33 (19:12/34:24/56:27) win at home, but they did not cover themselves with glory and only managed to excite their around 1.000 fans at August-Bebel-Sporthalle in the third quarter.
“Hannover kept up quite well in the first half and presented themselves a lot better than you would assume, given their spot in the table.” says RSV-coach Nicolai Zeltinger after the game. His Wetzlar team on the other hand left a number of chances unused, despite shooting well from the distance. “Our aim was to become more dangerous, and we have achieved that, but we obviously cannot be happy with a hit-ratio of only 39%.”
Some issues were of course to be expected, trying a new line-up without Steve Serio or Michael Paye in the starting five. Nicolai Zeltinger chose this variation, as the team will have do without the two US-American national players in the first game of the new year on the 4th of January against RSB Team Thueringen: “For it being the first time, the team did do a good job, it’s just the finishing that is not what we’d wish for.”
So the defence became the core of the RSV-game again. But to start with Hannover presented themselves pretty well going via 6:7 (4th min) to 16:21 (12th min), keeping them in the game. In this phase only centres Joe Bestwick and Dirk Koehler were successful at the opposition’s basket. They added 12 of the first sixteen points, before Juniors-world-champion Thomas Boehme pushed the score to 28:18 (17th min) in the second quarter.
Hannover seemed to have tired out a bit after the change-over working against the Lahn-Dill-defence. The team around top-scorer Tan Caglar did not manage a lot offensively, whilst RSV had only just started. The highlight of the game was the 26th minute, when the Wetzlar team scored three three-pointers within only one minute, changing the score to 54:25.
But the hosts did not win a hands-down-victory, as people might have been expecting. The team were in top-form until the 68:31 (36th min), achieved through another three by Serio, which did decide the game before it finished. But nearly five minutes without points on either side did take away from an otherwise good looking quarter for RSV, who did not shine offensively.
Lahn-Dill: Thomas Boehme (23/2 Dreier), Dirk Koehler (12), Michael Paye (10/1), Steve Serio (9/1), Joe Bestwick (6), Jan Haller (4), David Amend (2), Felix Schell (2), Annabel Breuer, Thomas Gundert, Bjoern Lohmann, Marco Zwerger.
Hannover: Tan Caglar (12), Martin Kluck (8), Eike Gößling (6), Jan Sadler (6), Thomas Schroeder (1), Felix Heise, Niko Kavazis, Michael Moellenbeck, Andrea Seyrl.