Croatia Win Sees Portugal Advance

Marko Tomas buried a three-pointer with 3.1 seconds remaining as Croatia stunned Spain 85-84 to finish top of Group B in Seville.

The win, achieved in Seville’s San Pablo Pavilion, gained partial revenge for the Croatians who were knocked out of EuroBasket 2005 by Spain in the quarter-finals.

The result also put Portugal into the next round, while eliminating Latvia – the team that beat Croatia in the opening game, 85-77.Portugal upset Latvia on Wednesday.

“I’m really happy that we qualified for the next round with four points, that’s a big advantage for us,” said Croatia coach Jasmin Repesa.

“But, at the same time, we have to stay quiet and go game by game because we’ve seen many surprises already in this championship. I believed after the first big loss to Latvia, that we would get to Madrid. But I was worried how we played then.”

In a EuroBasket which has had several incredible finishes, this one ranks near the top.Croatia had trailed 50-40 at half time but returned to the court after the break and tightened up their defense.

Trailing 58-50, they went on a 10-2 run to tie the contest at 60 a piece.Davor Kus, who hit a three-pointer in that spurt, said: “We played a very poor first half when they had 50 points, but we were only down by 10.

“We said we had to improve on defense and when we did that, we were much more aggressive.”

Once they were back on level terms, the Croatians looked a far more confident side.
Leading 71-70, Marko Banic struck with a jumper in the lane and, after Berni Rodriguez missed from three-point range, Banic struck again with a long-range bomb.

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source : eurobasket2007.org