Larkin leads Turkey to bounceback victory against Great Britain

ISTANBUL (Turkey) – Turkey avoided a dreaded 0-2 start to their FIBA Basketball World 2023 European Qualifiers campaign as they battled back from an early deficit to defeat Great Britain 84-67 on home soil.

Having trailed by as many as 13 in the contest, Turkey put together a 15-0 run in the third and claimed their first win in Group B to ignite their hopes.

Turning point: Great Britain made a fast start off the back of their win against Greece with an 11-0 run establishing a 23-10 advantage. However, Turkey got themselves going to level by half-time and they pulled clear in the second half to complete a convincing victory.

Game heroes: Shane Larkin played a leading role in the comeback effort to finish with 22 points and 8 assists as well as 2 blocks to help out on the defensive end. Bugrahan Tuncer posted 17 points and 12 assists with Metecan Bircan also adding a double-double with 11 points and 12 rebounds.

Stats don’t lie: Sharing is caring and Turkey finished with 25 assists to Great Britain’s 11 with the visitors unable to sustain their hot start as they finished with 38-percent shooting from the floor with Turkey above 68-percent from inside the arc.

Bottom line: An early must-win for Turkey and they duly delivered despite an early scare. They finish the first window 1-1 alongside Great Britain, who will be the happier of the two sides with a crucial double-header coming up against Belarus in February 2022.

They said: “Congratulations to Turkey, they deserved to win. They paid well and dictated a lot of elements of the game and executed well offensively. They made some adjustments when we tried to react to what they were doing. Obviously adding the two guys made a difference for them and it was challenge for us to try to cover them. I am proud for the battle and for the effort from my guys, we tried to do a lot of tings well, in line with our game plan, but unfortunately it was one of those night than in the last couple of minutes we are not very please about how it went.” – Great Britain head coach Marc Steutel

“In the first half we were trying to find our rhythm and had a lot of turnovers and some bad shots, but we stayed with it, we picked up our defensive intensity in the second quarter and got back into our rhythm. In the second half we played with the same intensity, got to run a little bit and started making some shots and stayed together and were able to get a big win for our team.” – Turkey guard Shane Larkin

“It was an important win but I am not satisfied with the game we played today, with some of our minutes on the court. We have to be realistic and this is not our level. We respect the opponents but today at our home court, with our fans, we should have made a different start. Unfortunately, we were down by 14 points at the beginning and we spent energy to come back. We raised our intensity defensively and made the difference, but we weren’t 100 percent correct on every possession and we were not tough enough at the beginning of the game.” – Turkey head coach Orhun Ene

source：https://www.fiba.basketball/