Bosnia and Herzegovina off to winning start as bench boosts comeback effort

SARAJEVO (Bosnia and Herzegovina) – Bosnia and Herzegovina wiped out a 14-point deficit on their way to an opening 97-90 victory at home to Czech Republic to start the party in Sarajevo.

Spurred on by their bench, the home side completed the turnaround in the third quarter and pulled clear to join Lithuania in making a winning start in Group F of the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023 European Qualifiers.

Turning point: Czech Republic came out strong in a 21-9 start and their lead peaked at 53-39 as they would go into the half-time break with a double-digit cushion. However, the game changed in the third as Bosnia and Herzegovina outscored the visitors 31-11 in a pivotal period before pulling away down the stretch.

Game heroes: Dzanan Musa marked his return to the national team with a 21-point haul with Amar Gegic also reaching 20 points off the bench with 8-of-10 shooting. There were also three starters in double figures to help propel the hosts to victory.

Stats don’t lie: Czech Republic coughed the ball up 19 times which led to 27 points for their opponents with the hosts also benefiting from their depth with 48 points from the bench.

Bottom line: Bosnia and Herzegovina had high hopes following their impressive FIBA EuroBasket 2022 qualification campaign and started off on the right foot once again on home soil. They will head on the road to face Bulgaria with the optimism to close the first window 2-0, while Czech Republic face another early test as they take on Lithuania desperate not to extend their winless start into February.

They said: “First of all, it was a great atmosphere today and it reminded me the good old days of basketball when we had fans. We started well on offense, but on defense we were not so good through the whole game. In the second half we had problem to find our offense against their aggressive defense. We had problems with the defensive rebounds, it’s not a secret that we don’t have enough big guys to compete at this level, but I am very happy with the big guys we do have, they gave 100 percent. You cannot say it’s a good loss because there is no good loss but the 7-point margin keeps us alive for the future and I think we will cover this loss in the next windows” – Czech Republic head coach Ronen Ginzburg

“We didn’t start well enough and the reason for this was our lack of experience of playing at home. This team has a big heart and the guys want to give the maximum, but today they burned out in the first half. We didn’t do anything right defensively at the start and we let them score easy points. We know they are amazing shooters and you saw it too, they made 11 three-pointers in the first half. At halftime we had a very good conversation and we came out in the third quarter much more aggressive, we took away their open shots, we focused on that and we turned the game around. We showed character and won at home, the guys needed this experience and I am very happy for them, they deserved this.” Bosnia and Herzegovina head coach Vedran Bosnic

new source : https://www.fiba.basketbal