Officially begins Salvation phase of the Sella Cento, at home against Latina. Benedetto suffers from the absence of Mitchell, in his place Mussini in the quintet, with Palumbo, Delfino, Archie and Bruttini. Coach Sacco responds with Mayfield, Parrillo, Romeo, Alipiev and Moretti. Also for Latina there was an absence, that of Viglianisi.
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Palumbo eats up the pitch in transition, Archie scores two triples and the start says 8-2 Sella. Palumbo uses his centimeters to attack Romeo in the post and capture an offensive rebound, converted into two points. Alipiev keeps his team in touch with an open triple and a noteworthy penetration, on the other hand Mussini joins the game with a forced triple at the end of 24 seconds. + 5 Saddle. Alipiev continues to create problems for the red and white defense, he gets up from three points with very high percentages and Latina rides the moment, raising her aggression and making herself felt on the rebound, Cicchetti restores parity with a 1/2 from the line. Alipiev signs again from long distance Latina takes the leadthe first of the match, but Daniele Toscano closed the first quarter with a triple to make it 20-all after 10 minutes.
The second quarter opens again with the energy of Latina, who catches another offensive rebound, Mladenov goes to the rim and Musso stops him with a foul, deemed unsportsmanlike. La Sella fails to give fluidity to his attack and another basket from Alipiev forces Mecacci to time out. Cento remains empty for the first three minutes of the quarter, then Mussini earns two free throws and unblocks the team, which above all with the return of Palumbo finds its
offensive transition and scores 4 points in a row, until Romeo stops Mussini on the counterattack, in an unsportsmanlike manner. Mussini and Palumbo place two triples in a row, but Romeo’s reply doesn’t take long, the game suddenly lights up and the scoreboard reads 34-32 for the hosts and coach Sacco time out.
Palumbo is the absolute dominator of the mid range and places another stop and shot from the mid range, on the other side Moretti first, with a movement with his back to the basket and Borra with a dunk they bring Latina back ahead, Sacco’s move to raise the quintet is slightly annoying Cento, in the two halves of the pitch, the last minute proceeds without any rings, but with 4 seconds left it is Mussini who thinks about it and scores a triple logo, to close the first half of the match 42-40. 17 of a sensational Federico Mussini, already halfway through the race. After the first four points, all from Latina, Bruttini unlocks Cento with the house specialty, the reception in the low post, then Latina takes advantage of an unfinished counterattack from Archie and puts her head forward again, while Mussini continues to put the defense in difficulty from Beneacquista, but he only makes 1/2 of his free throws and the score is still tied. 46-46.
Then Moretti scores in the center of the area and Alipiev scores again with three points, Sella struggling to find the rhythm again of the last minutes of the first half, Romeo takes the center of the paint and scores by climbing on the defense, +5 Latina and Benedetto timeout. Good news is the return to the field of Mladenov, who had come out in pain in the first minutes of the match, Musso chases away the fear with a triple that also puts Baltur back into the game, but Mayfield immediately extinguishes the enthusiasm with a mid-range basket, before the two free of Alipiev. Latina manages to put Cento in difficulty in attack with the Romeo-Alipiev pair, who are very inspired and, in defence, with the physicality of Borra and the aggressiveness of the wingers.
53-62 and maximum advantage for the guests, until Archie releases the tension with a triple after the game is broken, Toscano earns two free throws to bring the Sella back into contact and Palumbo scores from midrange, after a feint: -4 red and white. Latina loses a couple of balls and is not perfect from the line, Moreno escapes on the counterattack and manages to place the equal 65 on the glass at the end. Latina punctures the Centese defense twice with cuts from the weak side, then Toscano exceeds the protests and gets a technical, on Latina +7. Cento fails to find the key to raising the offensive intensity and Latina controls the pace of the racesix minutes from the end, there are 9 points to recover for Sella. The usual Mussini transforms a good team action into three points, but Zangheri immediately replies with the same coin.
Mussini doesn’t even have it for a bit and scores an impossible basket with the foul, then shoots a three-pointer for -3 with less than two minutes to go. Incredible match for the red and white 4, which risks not being enough as Latina earns a trip to the line which is pure oxygen for the guests, after Moretti’s 2/2, Mussini misses the triple of -2 and Parrillo punishes from the other he starts after a sly game and virtually closes the game. Latina managed to impose its rhythm and break the inertia of the Cento team, a bit along the lines of the last match between these two teams. It ends 80-88.
