Partizan Rallies Past Bayern in Munich

Partizan Belgrade beat Bayern Munich 86⁠–⁠84 on Friday, 2 October, in Munich, Germany, in Round 3 of the EuroLeague, Europe’s top club basketball league, and stayed unbeaten at 3⁠–⁠0 (Eurohoops; BasketNews). Carlik Jones scored 12 of his 16 points in the fourth quarter and added five assists after Partizan had trailed by as many as 13 in the third. Tonye Jekiri led Partizan with 17 points and five rebounds (BasketNews; Eurohoops). Duane Washington Jr. led Bayern with 20 points but missed a potential game-winning three-pointer at the buzzer; Johannes Thiemann added 17 points and five rebounds (Eurohoops; BasketNews). Partizan outscored Bayern 29⁠–⁠19 in the fourth after quarter scores of 22⁠–⁠27, 24⁠–⁠20, 11⁠–⁠18 and 29⁠–⁠19. Tip was 20:00 CEST (2:00 p.m. ET).

The EuroLeague is a season-long league of continental clubs, not a one-weekend cup. A three-pointer is a shot from beyond the arc, worth three points. An assist is a pass that leads directly to a basket; a rebound is a missed shot gathered in. The buzzer is the horn that ends a period — a shot that leaves the hand before it still counts. Performance index rating, or PIR, is the league’s single efficiency number, folding points, rebounds, assists and other box-score pluses and minuses into one total (Eurohoops; BasketNews).

The shape of the night was a hole, then a rush. Bayern led 65⁠–⁠57 entering the fourth after holding Partizan to 11 points in the third, the ABA League reported. That matched the quarter line: Partizan 22, 24 and 11 through three periods, Bayern 27, 20 and 18. The largest margin was 13 in that third quarter, not merely the eight-point gap at the break between periods (BasketNews; aba-liga.com). Jones and the rest of the roster then produced 29 fourth-quarter points to Bayern’s 19. The final was 86⁠–⁠84.

“It was a tester, I’ll say that,” Jones said afterward. “A lot of things didn’t go my way, a lot of things didn’t go our way, but we prevailed. We stuck to the game plan” (BasketNews). He credited Kevarrius Hayes with “the big stop at the end of the game” and Jekiri for “playing the way he’s been playing the last few games,” and called the win resilience and heart: “We could have easily laid down and let them kind of grow a lead, but we fought, we fought, we fought.” Hayes finished with seven points and two blocks. Jekiri made 7 of 10 two-point shots and all 3 of his free throws, with five rebounds, one assist and an efficiency rating of 21 (BasketNews).

Jones’s own line was 16 points on 7 of 12 from two, plus five assists and two rebounds, 12 of those points coming after the third-quarter deficit (BasketNews). Around him, Luca Vildoza scored eight, with two three-pointers in three attempts, four assists and three steals, and Alessandro Pajola handed out seven assists. The team count showed how the comeback was built: Partizan shot 33 of 69 (48 percent) to Bayern’s 25 of 53 (47 percent), won assists 25⁠–⁠16 and steals 13⁠–⁠6, and committed eight turnovers to Bayern’s 17. Bayern made 24 of 28 free throws (86 percent) to Partizan’s 11 of 14, and won the rebounding 34⁠–⁠32, with Austin Wiley taking 10 (BasketNews).

Washington, a former Partizan guard, scored Bayern’s 20 with four assists and 4 of 7 from three, and still had the last look (Eurohoops; BasketNews). The three at the buzzer did not go in. Thiemann’s 17 came with five rebounds, a perfect 8 of 8 from the line and a team-high PIR of 25. Vladimir Lucic added nine points, Andreas Obst eight and Justinian Jessup seven (BasketNews). None of it was enough once the fourth quarter flipped.

Partizan are one of four clubs alone at 3⁠–⁠0 after Round 3, with Panathinaikos, Fenerbahçe and Valencia (Eurohoops). The ABA League called it a perfect start kept by that fourth-quarter turn: 86⁠–⁠84, Jones’s 12 in the fourth, and a three at the buzzer that stayed out.