It took 14 games and more than two months of Turkish Airlines EuroLeague action, but CSKA Moscow finally put up a healthy full roster.
| Player of the Game | |
|
EFF
36
|
| Nikola Milutinov | |
| Points | 19 |
| Accuracy | 8-9 |
| Rebounds | 12 |
| Assists | 0 |
And with Nikola Milutinov registering his best game in CSKA jersey, it should be scary news for the opponents.
"I hope we don't jinx it," Dimitrios Itoudis said while also knocking on a wooden table in Zalgirio arena's press conference room. "We want to stay healthy. Niko (Milutinov), Toko (Shengelia), Grigonis are coming from injuries, Danny (Hackett) had surgery in the summer, Joel (Bolomboy) was out for a long time. Those players need time to make adjustments."
Milutinov, who missed most of the last season due to shoulder surgery, injured his knee in the opening game of 2021-2022 season and missed eight games.
He returned to the floor on 17th of November, but it took some time to get going.
In Kaunas, he was firing on all cylinders.
The big Serbian scored 19 points, grabbed 12 rebounds, 6 of them on the offensive glass. He registered a PIR of 36, his highest while playing for CSKA in EuroLeague.
"It's important for us to stay healthy, so we can evaluate the potential we have," Itoudis said. "Right now, Niko is back and gives a different dimension of what we can do."
CSKA limited Zalgiris to a season-low 51 points.
Itoudis particularly liked defensive numbers in the second, third and fourth quarters, with 10, 11, and 12 points allowed, respectively.
"Undoubtedly, we won the game from our defensive effort. We were thrilled, motivated, and concentrated to play consistently for three quarters when Zalgiris scored around 10 points. That means a lot. Even though they had a good start hitting threes and getting that extra boost from fans that they get in this great atmosphere. We established a better status quo on the defensive end", Itoudis said.
"19 turnovers forced, most of them were the result of the good defense. Offensively we had some issues, especially in the second quarter attacking against switch defense. We were stuck, slow and didn't use the shot clock the good way. The second half was completely different. We talked about changing a little bit how we attack against switch defense. We have a lot of post players, we can attack from in to out. That gave us 27-11 in the third quarter, which was critical turning the game in a different direction."
