Army team continue their way to the title of Russian Cup championship. Today CSKA defeat Khimki in the semifinal: 91-81. Dusan Ivkovic team made a big advantage in the early beginning thank to David Andersen who became the best sniper of the game with 27 points.
CSKA vs Khimki: 91-81
The starting five of the army team has clearly shown that they will try for the third time in a row move to Russian Cup final four: Brown, Holden, Granger, Monya and Andersen. This time Martin Muursepp was out of the technical roster. Both teams could not score any field goals until Holden score 2 points in the beginning of the third minute: 5-4. After two minutes of equal game army team started their spurt and soon increased their advantage to 10 points: 14-4 and time-out of Sergey Elevic. He put to the parquet Vuksanovic who scored 7 points in a row. But it was not enough to catch CSKA. Center of the army team has shown very good game in the first quarter and put to the basket the most part of our points.
In the second quarter CSKA was close to increase their advantage to 20 points but then they lost concentration and rhythm of the game. The big rest did not change this situation. In the middle of the third quarter Dusan Ivkovic team let the opponent to cut advantage to 3 points only. This moment Holden stopped spurt of Khimki by good 3-pointer: 56-50. Then Brown became the leader of the army club and with the help of Andersen could get the initiative for our team. CSKA could not stop only one player of the team of Moscow Region: Ruben Wolkowyski. But he could not stop CSKA in one face. Army team catch the third final of Russian Cup in a row. The final game will take part tomorrow at 18:00 CET.
The head coach of CSKA Dusan Ivkovic:
- It was good game. Our best quarter was the first one. In the scond half we lost concentration and rhythm of the game. Players of opponent Karasev and Petrenko made several conflict situation, after what Andersen and Brown lost their concentration. I respect Khimki who shows good power basketball, but today they played not correct. I think that we absolutely deserved this victory. Now we have 24 hour to prepare to the final game.
The head coach of Khimki Sergey Elevich:
- Today our main mistake was the fact that we could not stop Andersen who score 27 points, it is too many. The result of the game was made in the first quarter when the army team made big advantage. Usually we play good against CSKA but now it is practically impossible to defeat them. Tomorrow in 3rd place game we will play only for win.