JOVANOVIC: “I EXPECTED THIS KIND OF A GAME, I HOPE WE WILL LOOK BETTER IN THE NEXT GAMES”

Mega Mozzart beat Sloboda 79:78 (29:12, 14:25, 14:21, 22:20) and took the lead with 1: 0 in the quarterfinal series of the playoffs of the Serbian Superleague. The guests from Uzice showerd strong resistance, and in the very finish, with the result 79:78, Ruzhentsev missed two free throws, Sloboda were successful in the jump, but in a few seconds, although they transferred the ball to the attack field, they failed to take a shot towards basket thanks to the very good defense of Uskokovic.

The quarterfinal series of the playoffs is played in the best of three, and the second game is on the program already on Monday, May 9, at 7 pm in Uzice. The eventual third match will be played on Wednesday, May 11, in the Mega Factory hall.

At the press conference after the game, Mega’s coach Vladimir Jovanovic pointed out that his players showed that it still does not function as a team:

– We opened the match well, but every change was a problem, because the team I lead now consists of practically two parts, of the guys I led throughout the season and four, five players we added from OKK Beograd. We showed that we are not functioning as a team yet, which was not to be expected considering that we have been together for only seven days. I don’t think that their zone defense disturbed us, but we dropped out of the game organizationally. We did not cooperate enough and it is normal that because of that the game went into the equalizer. It should be said that it is also the merit of Sloboda, which is an excellent team and was brilliantly led by my colleague Oliver Popovic. Honestly, I expected a game like this, and I hope that in time we will start to function better, that the guys will cooperate better and that we will look better in the continuation of the competition,

said Jovanovic.

Mega’s captain Luka Cerovina said that his team made a lot of mistakes, but that in the end they still won:

– I would like to congratulate Sloboda on a great game. We opened the match well, we had a 17-point advantage at the end of the first quarter, but then they switched to the zone defense, which we did not manage the best. We made a lot of mistakes and we didn’t manage to hit the shots. However, in the end we came to victory and we hope for a better game in Uzice,

said Cerovina.

Photo: Mega Mozzart/Ivica Veselinov