Visiting Beşiktaş Cola Turka Women’s Basketball Team suffered a 65-55 derby loss to Galatasaray in the 3rd week of the TBBL.

The hot-shooting Galatasaray got off to a fast start and stormed to an early lead with consecutive baskets from outside. Unable to overcome home side’s solid defense, Black and Whites had trouble finding baskets and fell behind 22-9 at the end of the opening quarter.
Beşiktaş Cola Turka’s shooting woes continued in the second as it had great difficulty answering Galatasaray’s offensive drives. The yellow and red team took advantage of Black and Whites’ lackluster defensive performance and poor-shooting and knocked down back-to-back jumpers from all over the floor to increase their advantage even further. Lifted by superior rebounding Galatasaray took a 42-26 lead before heading to its locker room at the half-time break.
Beşiktaş Cola Turka opened the second half with Stacey Lovelace’s basket but could not get anything going offensively and wasted many easy shots to erase the deficit.  Nonetheless, as quarter progressed Black and Whites put out a much better defense and disturbed their traditional rival’s offensive rhythm. As a result both teams managed to score only 4 points within the first 5 minutes. But, unable to get inside, Galatasaray this time turned to outside shots and regained the control. Despite a late surge by Venessa, Beşiktaş Cola Turka fell way short of displaying its usual game and trailed 52-37 at the end of third quarter.        
However it was a completely different story in the final quarter as Black and Whites finally got back on their feet and managed to cut the deficit to 9 points at 54-45 with 7 minutes remaining. Helped by Hayden’s baskets under the hoop, Beşiktaş Cola Turka played aggressive defense and a 3-pointer by Nilay Yiğit brought our ladies to within 6 points. But Galatasaray quickly regrouped and tried to hold onto to its advantage with fast-break points. The yellow and red team was ahead 61-55 going into the final minute of play. Black and Whites made a last spurt to get back into the game but it was too little and too late. The home team prevailed in the end and walked way with 65-55 victory.