Our Men’s Basketball Team lost to Fenerbahçe Ülker (83-71) at the 2nd week of Beko Basketball League in Abdi İpekçi Sport Center.

Starting the derby game with Cevher Özer, Jamel Thomas, Barış Özcan, Brooks Sales and Reese first five our Beşiktaş responded its opponent’s baskets and kept the game close during the early part of the first period. Cevher’s three pointer tied the score (7-7) at 4th minute. However from this moment on Beşiktaş defense was unable to stop Kambala under our own basket and fell behind. Although missing some easy shots, Beşiktaş recovered again and went ahead (19-18) 30 seconds left in the first period. Unfortunately, Solomon’s basket-foul 2.9 seconds to go made the score (22-19) in favor of Fenerbahçe at the end of first 10 minutes.
During the start of the second period Beşiktaş again had problems to control Kambala. The easy baskets scored by this player from the painted area made the score (28-25) for Fenerbahçe at 14th minute. The high percentage of three point shots by Fenerbahçe started to extend their lead after the 15th minute of the game. Back to back baskets of Solomon, Mirsad and Kambala opened the gap to (39-27) at 17th minute. Unable to provide any additional scoring due to poor offensive performance, our side went to the dressing room down (46-33) at the half.
Despite starting the third period with Jamel Thomas’s score Beşiktaş couldn’t upgrade its overall performance. The effective inside defensive play of Fenerbahçe made the score (60-42) at the 27th minute. Not letting the 13 points gap created in first half and due to the unimpressive offensive showing of our forward line created a 20 point advantage for Fenerbahçe with the score of Oğuz Savaş who brought the score 69-48 at the end of the third period.
Our opponent started the last period with three pointers from Mrsic and İbrahim Kutluay and responded Beşiktaş’s points with Mrsic’s additional scoring. Unable to repeat the positive performance of the first period neither in offense nor in defense our side lost the game (83-71).