An almost perfect end to the match!

For the 14th day of the Espoirs ELITE championship, the team coached by Patrice Koenig went to Saint-Quentin to face the bottom of the championship. The Espoirs knew how to impose their rhythm from the start and won with the final score of 56 to 83.

Coach Patrice Koenig lined up Maxence Lemoine, Jahel Trèfle, Alexy Ragoo, Harold Tchoua and Erwan Merlin to start the match. Our Espoirs imposed their pace of play from the start, which worked (2-5, 2’30). The gap was established in just 4 minutes of playing time (2-10, 4′). The Strasbourg team was led by its offensive leader Maxence Lemoine, capable of both scoring and creating opportunities for his teammates (7-12, 6′). Japhet Moupadele, a real soldier on the field, intercepted the ball on a throw-in below his basket to finish without difficulty (7-16, 7′). For this match, Patrice Koenig proposed a way of playing that we had not seen during the first championship matches, a counter-attack game based on very strong defenses (9-18, 8′). The ball moved so fluidly that after a few seconds of possession, the opposing defense was confused, which led to free players in the racket. The first quarter ended on a bad note for Strasbourg with two counter-attacks for Saint-Quentin who only came within 5 points (14-18, 10′).

The opponents were starting to get used to the passing lines used by Strasbourg, which allowed them to go ahead for the first time in the match (21-20, 12′). The Saint-Quentin Espoirs had toughened their defense, but this detail did not prevent our young people from finding a solution to score. To stop the iron defense that the opponent had put in place, our team caused a maximum of fouls to not only have free throws, but also so that the Espoirs of Saint-Quentin were afraid of contact (29-32, 17′). Saint-Quentin held off Strasbourg as best he could, but the tenacity of our Espoirs prevented them from going ahead in the score. (35-37, 20′).

After 3 minutes of restart, our Espoirs had difficulty getting started, unlike their opponents. SIG Strasbourg was carried on the river of bad luck (42-41, 24′). Our youngsters regained momentum by creating a small gap thanks to Erwan Merlin and Japhet Moupadele (43-49, 27′). The third quarter ended on a positive note for our young SIGmen despite a difficult start (56-53, 30′).

A very good start to the match for our young soldiers who continued to widen the gap which did not please the opposing coach (53-64, 33′). The boat on which the opponent seemed to be sailing must have had a hole in the hull, because the latter took on water at the end of the match (53-74, 35′). The Chinese wall had been installed in the Strasbourg racket! Our players did not take a single point in this fourth quarter (0-22, 6’06). The Strasbourg coach could be proud of his players who made their desire to win come true with the passage of 24 seconds. An exceptional fourth quarter from our Espoirs who only conceded three points in this last quarter and won largely with the final score of 56 to 83.