Italy Dismantle Lithuania In Second Half, Advances To Quarter Finals

ITALY 72 – LITHUANIA 58

First quarter was all about trading baskets with the lead changing hands five times. Gintare Petronyte scored Lithuania’s first five points and Italy answered and put in front after scoring five straight points – a trey from Raffaella Masciadri and a fastbreak from Simona Ballardini to make it 9-5 afte barely three minutes and lead almost the whole quarter. Egle Stakneviciene put Lithuania briefly ahead 13-14 with 3:50 remaining but Laura Macchi regain inmediatley the lead for Italy, reaching the second 21-19 ahead.

In the second the game was stuck. Lithuania was better in defense leading to Italy mistakes and letting them just 8 pts in the quarter but their lack of accuracy on offense and not taking advantage from the foul bonus in which Italy entered after 4 minutes, deprived them of taking a closing lead. An 8-2 run in the first 3:20. It started with a threepointer from Ausra Bimbaite and capped by five straight points from Gintare Petronyte - put ahead Lithuania 27-23 which would lead until the break after trading baskets again with the Italians, reaching the interval ahead 37-31.

After the break Italy came back more focused and stopped Lithuania in defense, especially Egle Stankeviciene and Gintare Petronite, the last one wouldn’t score in the second half, as well as Ausra Bimbaite. Italy left scoreless Lithuania during the first six minutes of the quarter as Italy scored a 12-0 run in which Masciadri, Macchi and Alexander scored four apiece to make it 43-37. this lead could have been bigger if they had taken advantage, as it happened to Lithuania in the second, of the foul bonus in which Lithuania entered after 3 minutes. Agne Ciudarene cut Lithuania’s scoring drought with four minutes remaining, where teams traded baskets until the end of the quarter which ended 48-43 after a late shot from Simona Ballardini.

In the last both teams struggled to score. It took 2:40 to score a field goal. Agne Ciudarene scored for Lituania making it 50-46. Italy got into foul bonus after 2:30 but Lithuania, stopped in the offense, didn’t took advantage of that one more time to close the gap and Italy took control of the game and put seven points up after 4 straight points from Pastore, 56-47, leading  Rutenis Paulauskas to call timeout after five minutes, after which Lithuania got into three points, 56-53, with 4:30 remaining but  Simona Ballardini hit the three to give air to her team making it 59-53 and the team went on controlling the rest of the game with a final 16-5 run (including the trey from Ballardini) to finish the game winning 72-58.

Marte Alexander had 17 pts -13 in the second half- and 7 boards, Laura Macchi 15 pts, Raffaella Masciadri 12 and Simona Ballardini 11 pts.

For Lituania Ausra Bimbaite had 17 pts, Agne Ciudarene 13, Egle Stakneviciene 12 and Gintare Petronyte 11 and 9 boards.