Albania halt Azerbaijan's unbeaten run in Group A; Austria clobber Moldova
SERRAVALLE (FIBA U16 European Championship 2018, Division C) – Xhersido Hajdari and Albania stopped Azerbaijan's unbeaten run in the FIBA U16 European Championship 2018, Division C with a sturdy 66-48 victory in Group A action on Thursday evening in San Marino.
The 16-year-old center Hajdari dominated the glass and left the court with a 14-point and 22-rebound double-double, as Albania improved to a 2-0 record in the standings. His teammate Ettore Marku shared the game's top-scorer honors with 14 points, while Azerbaijan's big trio of Marko Milovanovic, Ramiz Guliyev and Jabrayil Akbarov had relatively quiet performances.
All 12 players got on the board for Austria
In the other Group A contest, Austria followed suit and also moved to 2-0 with an even more impressive 72-29 thrashing of Moldova, despite connecting on just 5-of-20 attempts from the free-throw line. Having gone 7-of-10 from the field, Lazar Gagic was the main star of the show with a game-high 14 points and 5 rebounds, but he too left some points on the stripe.
The two remaining undefeated teams of the group, Albania and Austria, will face each other on Saturday after a scheduled rest day in the tournament on Friday.
Meanwhile, Panagiotis Karras had a field day against Gibraltar in Group B, helping Wales to a 68-31 victory that moved their marker to 2-0. The Welsh forward made 7-of-9 attempts from the field and finished with an efficient 14-point and 8-rebound line on the score sheet, while teammate Kian Davis chipped in with 12 points in just under 16 minutes of action.
Things are looking great for Wales in Group B after two wins in a row
Wales and Andorra, who had a bye day on Thursday, are joint-second in the standings with 2-0 records and have a game in hand against Malta, 2-1, who climbed to the top of the standings for the time being after edging Scotland 60-56 in the other game of the day.
Matthew Scerri led the way for Malta with 23 points, 14 rebounds, 4 assists and 3 steals, as Louis Sullivan had team-highs of 12 points, 17 rebounds and 4 steals for Scotland.
FIBA
