Riga stay perfect on Day 1 at FIBA 3x3 World Tour Jeddah Final 2020

JEDDAH (Saudi Arabia) - After winning in Jeddah last year, Riga (LAT) continued their unbeaten run in Saudi Arabia on the opening day of the FIBA 3x3 World Tour Jeddah Final 2020 on December 18. 

THE TEAM

After winning both the Hungary and Doha Masters this year, Riga (LAT) started their campaign for their first-ever World Tour title with 2 narrow wins over Piran (18-16) and local favorites Jeddah in a game that Nauris Miezis had to finish in overtime.

The #2 player in the World scored no less than 10 points in the win against Jeddah and added 5 highlights. Karlis Lasmanis aka 'Batman' led the Latvian squad against Piran with 8 points.

ALSO UNDEFEATED

3 more teams had a clean 2-0 record on Friday:
- The #1 team in the World Liman (SRB)
- World Tour 2020 rookies Utena Uniclub (LTU)
- Reigning World Tour winners Novi Sad (SRB)

THE GAME

After an early defeat against Utena Uniclub, NY Harlem faced a win-or-go-home situation against the other Lithuanian finalist,  Sakiai Gulbele. 

It was a close game since the first second but with 4 minutes to go, Aurelijus Pukelis scored a 2 pointer to give his team a 5-point lead (12-7) but Disco Domo scored back-to-back 2s to bridge the gap (12-11). 

With less than 10 seconds to go, Domo tied the game to send it to overtime (18-18) and then, stepped up in money time to sink a Tissot buzzer beater and advance to the knock-out rounds.

THE PLAYERS

Ever heard of the player value? This is the 3x3 metric for a player’s statistical contribution on the court.

-  Vytautas Sulskis (Utena) led all players in P-Val with 20.7 and score 16 points.
- Mihailo Vasic (Liman) scored 77% from inside the arc and had a P-Val of 18.8
- World Tour Final 2019 MVP Tamas Ivosev  (Novi Sad) topped all scorers with 23 points and finished Day 1 with  a P-Val of 18.2
- World Tour Jeddah Masters 2019 MVP Nauris Miezis (Riga) had a P-Val of 15.6 after scoring 14 points and delivering 11 highlights


MORE STATS

- Tamas Ivosev  had a double-5 against Amsterdam with 12 points and 5 rebounds.
- Utena Uniclub  was the only team that finished both games before the limit.
-Ub (SRB) against Ulaanbaatar MMC Energy (MGL) was the Tissot Fastest Game of the day with a  playing time of 7min 14s 

THE BRACKET

 
Watch the knock-out rounds LIVE on youtube.com/FIBA3x3 and facebook.com/FIBA3x3 

FIBA