Cedevita Zagreb one win away from Croatian title

Cedevita Zagreb moved to within one game of retaining its Croatian league title with a big 83-97 road win over Cibona Zagreb in Game 2. The success handed the champs a 2-0 lead in the best of 5 series and now Cedevita Zagreb will have home court advantage as it aims for a three peat of league successes.

The club is now the dominant force in Croatian hoops and three consecutive league wins would enhance that feeling, while it would be Cedevita’s fourth crown overall. Cibona is still in the hunt though, and the most successful Croatian club historically (18 titles) will want to keep the series alive in a bid to win its first crown since 2013.

Each game is a Zagreb derby, with all the pride and bragging rights that comes with any inter-city rivalry. However, Cedevita Zagreb seems a gear ahead of Cibona, and Game 2 highlighted that fact.

Cibona Zagreb vs. Cedevita Zagreb, 83-97

Cibona opened with 5 unanswered points, but Cedevita responded with a 3-13 run that propelled the visitors to a 15-17 lead through ten minutes. From there the defending champions never looked back, using a 0-10 spurt in the second quarter to put real daylight on the scoreboard. The guests drained their first six three point effort and were dominating by halftime, the score reading 41-57. The second half soon became a formality as Cedevita made a 6-21 run in the third act and simply eased through the remainder of the game.

Game 3 will be played on Friday, and if Cedevita brings this game the title will be wrapped up.

The champs stunned Cibona with a massive first half, propelled by James White’s 17 points (18 points overall). Jacob Pullen netted 15 points in the win, followed by Miro Bilan and Luka Babic with 10 points apiece.

Cibona missed the injured Nebojsa Joksimovic and Jasmin Hukic, leaving Ivan Siriscevic to lead the losing effort with a game high 25 points.