Novosibirsk celebrates Superleague title

BC Novosibirsk clinched the Russian Superleague title on Tuesday evening with a nervy 64-65 road win in Game 3 of the championship series against Spartak Primorie Vladivostok. The victory marked a first Superleague crown for Novosibirsk and the club did it in style by sweeping the finals series 3-0. However, in Game 3 the champs were made to work hard and only just edged the contest.

Spartak Primorie set the early pace and through the opening quarter looked on course to get back into the series, taking a 19-15 lead after ten minutes. In the second frame the scoring slowed almost to a stop as both teams got plenty sloppy at the nets, allowing Novosibirsk to win the stanza 10-13 to make it a one point game at halftime, 29-28. The points started flowing again in the third act and the momentum remained with the visitors as they won the period 15-20 to make it 44-48 through three quarters. The hosts responded well in the final quarter and rallied to tie the game 63 apiece late on, but ultimately Novosibirsk held on courtesy of a championship winning two from Konstantin Pomogalov.

Sergey Tokerov topped a team effort for the champions with 11 points, while the losing home side looked to a game high from Ilya Popov with 21 points.