58:45-home-win over Salzburg – game hanging in the balance in last quarter
Second league team RSV Lahn-Dill II were trembling for a couple of minutes, before an 11:0-final spurt made the 58:45 (21:13/29:21/42:33)-win over RSV Basket Salzburg perfect. The Middle Hesse team had been dominating most of the game, but in the last quarter the team around captain David Amend had to fear the loss of the game.
And that was despite the fact that the game was running according to plan from the start for RSV. The first lead was for the guests, who were in front until the 4:6 (3rd min). But RSV-centre Felix Schell made quite clear early on that they weren’t giving out advent presents when he scored 12 alone in the first quarter. The tall Wetzlar player controlled the game well, offensively as well as defensively, and was the man of the match until change-over.
RSV Lahn-Dill II managed their lead well with different line-ups, and even though the offence subsided a little bit, the Middle Hesse defence stayed secure and kept the lively Salzburg playmaker Alexander Hoelinger and the centres Avdija Destani and Radim Reichl well under control.
But after change-over the guests were playing a lot more aggressively and got a lot of turnovers whilst RSV tried their luck repeatedly with risky passes. Coach Daniel Stange’s team stayed on top souvereignly until the 38:25 (26th min), but their offence drowned a bit in hectic plays whilst Salzburg crept up bit by bit. Salzburg’s wing player Conny Wibmer led her team to a 8:0-run and at 42:39 (33rd min) RSV-coach Daniel Stange had to call a time out.
Shortly after Karaman minimized the distance to 47:45 (37th min) and Wibmer even could have equalised. But she missed her shot and now RSV II went for it with an 11:0-final spurt, which secured the fifth success of the season despite the brief glitch.
“I never really felt like we were letting go of the game, even though it was tight at times.” Top-scorer Felix Schell never lost belief in a win for his team despite the little dip, and coach Daniel Stange agreed with the centre: “It was more obvious than the final score leads you to believe. Salzburg were taking advantage of our mistakes – so when we stopped making them the game was a done deal.” So with only two defeats RSV Lahn-Dill II have had a great first leg of the season.
As the game against Kaiserslautern had been brought forward the Wetzlar team will have a free weekend coming up and can be happy over a longer Christmas break. The second part of the season will start on the 19th of January against bottom-of-the-table-team Lux Rollers away in Luxemburg.
Lahn-Dill: Felix Schell (20), David Amend (18), Kai Gerlach (13), Christopher Huber (4), Tristan Paar (2), Zacharias Wittmann (1), Carsten Crombach, Barbara Groß, Selina Rausch.
Salzburg: Abdulgazi Karaman (12), Conny Wibmer (10), Andreas Bieber (8), Alexander Hoeglinger (7), Radim Reichl (4), Fred Huber (2), Walter Pfaller (2), Avdija Destani, Louise Forell.