Jaleen Smith was the best Berlin pitcher with 17 points Photo: City Press GmbH
By Nicolas Sowa
Alba Berlin is in the Bundesliga championship before the end. After a poor performance, the defending champion lost the third quarter-final game at home against ratiopharm Ulm 81:93 (46:53).
Alba is now 2-1 behind in the best-of-five series. On Wednesday (8.30 p.m.) Ulm can already make the semifinals perfect at home in the fourth game.
The best Berlin throwers in front of 10,843 spectators were Jaleen Smith with 17 and Johannes Thiemann with 16 points, in Ulm Bruno Caboclo was the most successful shooter with 22 points.
Albas Olinde vs Ulms Jallow Photo: City Press GmbH
As in the first two games of the series, there was a lot of fire in the game right from the start. Ulm acted very aggressively, but also quickly conceded many fouls. Apparently, this upset Ulm coach Anton Gavel so much that he conceded two technical fouls within a few seconds after a good six minutes. The coach should then leave the hall, which he did not do immediately.
Alba used the momentum and pulled away to 19:11. But at the beginning of the second quarter, the thread broke completely for the hosts. Ball losses and misses lined up.
Maodo Lo tries from a distance Photo: City Press GmbH
After a 0:9 run, the lead was gone again. And the guests sank one three-point throw after the other. So the gap was in double digits before the break (38:49).
And even after the change of sides, the hosts were still chasing a deficit because Ulm always had an answer. But Alba fought and was back on three points at the beginning of the last section (72:75).
But the error rate was just too high. So Ulm could always answer when the Berliners came closer. Ulm was able to rely on his good throw rate.