Barcelona outlasts Bamberg for first home win

FC Barcelona Lassa recorded its first home win in the 2016-17 Turkish Airlines EuroLeague by downing Brose Bamberg 78-74 in yet another nail-biter at Palau Blaugrana on Friday. Barcelona improved to 2-2, sharing sixth place with five other teams. Bamberg dropped to 1-3 and a three-way tie for 12th place. Bamberg's three defeats have come by a total of six points. Despite losing yet another player to injury, Ante Tomic late in the game, Barcelona won with efforts of 18 points and 6 assists from Tyrese Rice and 13 and 3 assists from Victor Claver. Stratos Perperoglou had 11 points and 6 assists, the same scoring total as Tomic, who played only 16 minutes. Joey Dorsey had 8 points and was the game's top rebounder with 9. For Bamberg, Fabien Causeur scored 17 of his 19 points in the first half, while Daniel Theis matched his scoring and had 5 rebounds. Barcelona played without injured scorers Juan Carlos Navarro and Justin Doellman, but got a boost by the return of Petteri Koponen just a month after he was hospitalized following a car accident in which he was a taxi passenger. Koponen played 15 minutes with 2 points, 3 rebounds and 1 steal.