BERLIN (Germany) - Germany moved into the Quarter-Finals at FIBA EuroBasket 2022 after overcoming Montenegro for an 85-79 victory on home soil in Berlin.

They led by as many as 27 points as a dominant first half paved the way to making it back to the last eight, despite a valiant second-half effort from Montenegro.

Turning Point: Montenegro scored the first points of the game, but that was as good as it got as their 18 seconds of time in front was soon forgotten as Germany went on an 11-0 run to establish control. The hosts had doubled up their opponents by half-time at 48-24 with the damage seemingly already done, though Montenegro applied late pressure with Kendrick Perry scoring all points in an 11-2 run to close within five in the final quarter.

TCL Player of the Game: Dennis Schroder orchestrated the offense with a team-high 22 points - including a huge dunk - to go along with 8 assists to get his teammates rolling early before helping close out the win after a minor scare in the fourth.

Stats Don't Lie: Germany poured in 29 points in the second quarter, whilst holding their opponents to just 24 points for the entire first half. And, that would give them a commanding advantage that proved too much to overcome.

Bottom Line: Germany carried their momentum over from Cologne to Berlin and can look forward to a possible Quarter-Finals showdown with Giannis and Greece, if they overcome Czech Republic. As for Montenegro, the Round of 16 proved one step too far - just as it did five years ago when they lost to Latvia at the same stage.

They Said:  "Two halves, two different ball games. I thought we played extremely well in the first half - good energy, the ball moved. Second half we saw the zone, struggled, lost momentum. We lost some discipline on the defensive end, we lost some focus. We worked on the zone in practice yesterday and it looked like we had never seen a zone before. Give credit to our players. They found a way." - Germany coach Gordie Herbert

"You can see that in basketball a big thing is momentum. We got affected by that. We got insecure and didn't play our game in the second half. We should have played like the first half. We are happy that we advanced but we need to clean up some things." - Jonas Wohlfarth-Bottermann, Germany

"We played two halves: the worst in the tournament and the best in the tournament. In the end, I think we had a good performance in this tournament. We passed the group, which was our goal. And then tonight we played such a bad first half and such a good second half. At one time it was a one-possession game. I am very happy to be part of this tournament with my team. Congratulations to this team." - Montenegro coach Bosko Radovic

"I want to credit Germany. They fought hard in front of a great home crowd. Over the course of the game we had our chances to fight back, but when you dig yourself a 20-point hole at halftime you have to exert a lot of energy to get that back. Regardless, we still had our chances. I’m proud of how we fought. We could have given up and said: Okay it was great while it lasted. We already accomplished enough but it's a credit to the resilience of this team that we gave it our all and came up just a little short." - Kendrick Perry, Montenegro

FIBA