Never cross the University of Bologna. The National University of Sciences and Technology Politehnica Bucharest knows this only too well. We’re in Salerno, where the European University Championships are taking place, and in the men’s basketball, Unibo are trailing badly, 8–21. Do you know how it ended? It finished 83–47, with CUS Bologna conceding just 5 and 7 points respectively in the third and fourth quarters to the hapless Romanians, who were completely lost. With this victory, the University of Bologna – which won silver last year when hosting the event – remains among the top four teams in Europe.
They’ll play tomorrow at 3 pm against the tough University of Ljubljana (though you can’t take anything for granted against a Slovenian side) in a bid to reach the final and thus return to competing for gold.
Here is Vittorio Zedda’s assessment: “An intense match. We started trailing on the scoreboard, as has often happened to us. Then our defence stepped up a gear. In the second half, it was one-way traffic. We kept up the defensive pressure and the shots that we’d been missing started to fall. And that’s how we sealed the win.”
Giulio Martini was equally impressed. “It was a tight affair at the start; they started off fresher. Then, with the substitutions, a lot of energy came in and we managed to fight back almost straight away. We’re tall, we’ve got plenty of players and we manage to bring a lot of energy to the game. We’re happy and can’t wait to play the next ones.”
The final word goes to the coach, Matteo Lolli, the all-time wins leader not only at university level but also at the Giardini Margherita Playground. “We started off a bit lackadaisical, just like in the first three matches. Let’s hope we don’t do that again in the semi-final. After that, we got our act together and there were no problems. We’re in the top four, we’re here and we’re still in the running.”
The scoresheet: Vittorio Zedda 13, Mattia Ferdeghini, Alessandro Grotti 2, Riccardo Galletti 6, Riccardo Ghedini 16, Giulio Martini 2, Alfonso Zampogna 3, Alessandro Scarponi 18, Francesco Buscaroli 4, Manuele Solaroli 11, Matteo Dias 6, Giacomo Bianchini 2.
Matteo Lolli, head coach; Giorgio Broglia, assistant coach; Gabriele Fin, team manager; Alex Ranuzzi and Daniele Gasparri, officials; Alessandro Tirozzi, referee.
Press Office – CUS Bologna ASD
