Sporting falls with bang in Azerbaijan and loses invincibility in Europe

A sporting basketball team lost, this Thursday, for the first time a game in this season's edition of the FIBA Europe Cup, after a trip to Azerbaijan that dictated defeat before the Azeris of Gence, by 69-67.

The leonina class even started the meeting in front of the marker, managing the short advantage until they managed to escape the opponent of the fourth round of the group phase C of the test, with a sequence of six consecutive points to make an 8-14 in the middle of the first room.

But the Azeri class, which has five Americans of great value on its squad, turned out to be the meeting in order to win, by 20-18 at the sound of the first horn.

It was there that Sporting could never again see the light at the end of the tunnel, as it was never in the game, even in situations of great tightness along the second and third quarters, where there was even a 13-point margin between the two teams.

The second partial smiled again at Gence, who, despite not having many people on the benches, would take advantage of the house factor to go to the break with five points of advantage. In the third quarter, it was another sample of the superiority that the visitors were able to have in this match, with the result at the entrance to the last period to be 54-47.

The fourth and final period was different, and showed a more aggressive Portuguese set in the attack on the basket, in order to be able to fight for victory at the meeting, being even until the end of the match with chances of doing so, since the last minute saw the margin be in only one possession of ball away.

However, Alvalade's class failed to convert the final move, which took place with 4.2 seconds to play, with a triple not to fall into the net and hit the hoop to give Gence reason to smile, with his first victory in this FIBA Europe Cup edition.

[News update]