TORTONA (Italy) - It doesn't get much more dramatic than a do-or-die matchup on the final Gameday of the Round of 16 in the Basketball Champions League.
If it was to get more dramatic than that, you can be pretty sure Bertram Derthona Basket's head coach Walter De Raffaele would be involved.
If you want a better understanding of what we mean when we say that, allow us to cast your mind back to Season 2 of the BCL.
Walter De Raffaele, then the coach of Umana Reyer Venezeia, oversaw his team's 108-101 triple overtime win against Banvit. Have a look at the highlights to refresh your memory.
If you look closely enough, you might recognize the coach on the Banvit bench being none other than Sasa Filipovski, the current head coach of FIT/One Wurzburg Baskets, Derthona's direct rival for qualification to the Quarter-Finals on Wednesday night.
So, given the history between the two coaches and the amount riding on the game for both clubs, we knew that Derthona vs Wurzburg was going to be a good one and we weren't disappointed.
The previous meeting between the two on January 28 resulted in an 80-79 win for Wurzburg in Germany. From the opening tip, we could see this game was going to be just as tight.
The Germans actually led the game for almost the entire first quarter and with the dynamic duo of Jhivvan Jackson and Zac Seljaas pouring in the points, it looked like Derthona could have a long night ahead of them.
However, De Raffele found the adjustments he needed and his team responded to those adjustments to win the second quarter by eight points.
From there they managed to control the rest of the game and weather the storm of Wurzburg's late comeback. So, how did they do it?
Let's dive in and take a look.
#1 Dominating the paint
In a game decided by just two possessions, the fact that Derthona outscored Wurzburg 36-26 in the paint was undeniably a huge factor in deciding the game.
If we look at where that paint scoring came from, Ismael Kamagate and Paul Biligha combined for 18 of those 36 Derthona paint points and only missed one shot between them.
They also combined for 10 free throw attempts, all from fouls whilst attempting shots in the paint and putting pressure on the heart of Wurzburg's defense.
If you watch the clip below, you can see that it wasn't just offensively that Derthona's bigs dominated this game; they also blocked shots and controlled the glass.
#2 Coaching adjustments
We alluded to the experience and mastery on the sidelines for both teams and the battle of the tactics boards went to De Raffaele on this occasion.
He used a full smorgasboard of options when it came to defensive schemes and always seemed to know the answer to the question before his opposite number Filipovski even had the chance to ask it.
Derthona also outscored Wuzrburg 22-9 on points from turnovers. In the video below we see two clips of adjustments by De Raffaele that not only led to Wurzburg turnovers, but also points for Derthona immediately after.
In the first clip, we see Wurzburg inbounding the ball at the start of the second quarter. Just before the play, De Raffaele had been holding up his fingers to signal the number 2 and then the number 3.
What he was asking his team to do was play a zone defense from the three-quarter court area, with three defenders at the top of the zone and two at the base.
The goal was to slow Wurzburg's offense, then rush them into forced plays and mistakes as the shot clock counted down. It worked perfectly as the Germans forced a pass after a Derthona trap of Jhivvan Jackson in the pick-and-roll, resulted in a turnover and opportunity to run.
The second clip is directly after a Wurzburg timeout. Jackson had already scored 9 points for the Germans and was clearly the player that Filipovski wanted to entrust with the ball to make a play.
Watch how De Raffaele sent #1 Christian Vital to faceguard Jackson and prevent him from catching the ball. Once they had taken Jackson out of the play, they were able to be very aggressive with their pick-and-roll defense.
Kamagate came out high with a hard hedge and trusted Kyle Weems and Tommy Kuhse to nail the rotations, which they did.
#3 X Factor contributions
When teams are as evenly matched as this and also know each other as well as these two rosters did, the margin of victory is usually so fine that strong performances from star players won't be enough to win the game.
This where X-Factor players step in. In this case, the first player to rise above the occasion was shooting guard, Leonardo Candi.
He put up 7 points, 3 assists and 2 steals in just 12 minutes on the floor. As you can see below, both of his steals came in one sequence. The heart and determination on display is exactly what it takes to win games like this.
Candi wasn't Derthona's only X factor. Veteran Kyle Weems had his biggest game of the season, and his body language and verbal leadership on the bench throughout the game made it very clear that he had no intention of leaving the arena with anything less than a win.
We can talk about the 16 points, 7 rebounds, and 6 assists that resulted in 20 efficiency points, but this performance was about much more than that.
Experience and know-how are invaluable when you get to this stage of the season and sometimes it's the IQ plays and understanding of moments that make an even bigger difference than big time boxscore numbers.
The video below is far from a Weems highlight reel from the game, but these are the plays that you maybe missed when it comes to decisive contributions.
The first clip, we see Weems give up a great look at a jump shot as he saw his teammate Kuhse with a better shot just as he was about to release.
In the second clip we see him use every ounce of veteran nouse to draw a foul on Jackson just as Wurzburg started to believe they could get back into the game.
With the draw for the Quarter-Finals now complete, Derthona know that they face the daunting task of overcoming the behemoth that is La Laguna Tenerife.
The Canary Islanders are 12-0 this season and head coach Txus Vidorreta is another that Walter De Raffaele knows very well.
They met in the Semi-Finals of Season 1 in Tenerife. We all know that Tenerife not only won that game but went on to win the inaugural BCL title in 2017.
No doubt De Raffaele will have already started planning for a way to get one over on Vidorreta but for now, we will leave you with his quotes after this game describing just how big this achievement is for this club to be in the Quarter-Finals in the first place.
He said:
"We are really, really, really happy for this historical result. It's something great, something amazing that has made our season really great. I'm happy for this young club."
"Talking about the European side of things, the club is really young, but so ambitious."
"It's important that we answer this ambition with this kind of result."