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Fierce fights, records of points and a drama with four overtimes during the first IABL season of 2018/2019 in Klaipėda

 On November 17, 2018 the first tournament of International Amateur Basketball League ( IABL) of the year 2018/2019 took place in Klaipėda, at the seaside of Lithuania. This year 8 teams from Lithuania, Latvia, Russia and Sweden are participating in the tournament. Some new teams are going to join the upcoming tournaments.

The teams are divided into subgroups „A“and „B“. The teams play one game once and later fight for the title of champions in summer of 2019.

Klaipėdos ,,Gobana“ - the novice of the league and a host of this tournament - ,,Urbovita League“ and a guest team KKL from Kaunas were the first to come out on the site. The players from Kaunas were not aware of the capabilities of the new rival, whereas since the very beginning of the game the host team started to prove their position as the strongest team of Klaipėda region in the course of several years. The players from Klaipėda with a striking power took the advantage of the game and they practically took over the control of the situation and won their first game in IABL history against players from Kaunas in a result 84:60.
H.Venskus scored 15 points for the winners, while K.Meiliūnas scored 17 points for the failed team.

In the second game, Lomonosov Moscow State University team, which was the previous year winner of Russia Students League had a fight with a team ,,Daikra“ from Klaipėda, which played instead of the team from St. Petersburgh. The first part of the game was quite with a tension, though later on the players from Moscow comfirmed their title of favourite ones and defeated the rivals 89:68.
S.Kozlov scored 25 points for the winners.

On the site of the other sports hall in Gargždai ,, Tegra“, a team from Vilnius seriously challenged the champions of the previous season ,,Rumba/LSPA“, a team from Riga, Latvia. Despite the players from Vilnius attempts and an equal fight against each other, thanks to the team star Nauris Miezis, who demonstrated high class game and scored almost half of the team points, the team from Latvia won. The team from Vilnius had no opponent players equal to Nauris brilliant game and had to give up in a result 92:106.
As it was already mentioned above, N.Miezis score even 52 points for „Rumba/LSPA“ team! V.Bendikas scored 22 points for the team from Vilnius.
Next, Kaunas KKL team and Klaipėda „Daikra“ played a game. In the beginning, the teams were more or less equal, but since the second half Kaunas team scored an advantage as a shoot and celebrated the victory for sure 102:79.
K.Meiliūnas scored 22 points.

In another game Moscow „You‘re On“ had a fight with Swedish team „Hoganas“. There has been fixed even four overtimes! That has never happened in the history of IABL yet. The teams have been equally playing for overall 40 minutes, though it had been a failure to clear up the winner during the regulation play. It was a failure after the first, second and third overtimes and only the mandated fourth overtime the players from Moscow with more strength saved, managed to win in a result 107:102. It is worth to mention, that 77 rebounds by the team from Sweden were fixed as a new IABL record. M.Klikov, a member of the winner‘s team, performed a triple-double (25 points, 11 assists and 10 rebounds).

After such amazing game, two novice teams of this season had a fight, though they have already earned the giants title of the IABL season of 2018/2019 . The teams are Klaipėda ,,Gobana“ - ,,Urbavita lyga“ and Lomonosov Moscow State University team. The game of both teams has been quite equal since the start and none of teams were going to give up, though later the players from Moscow proved their advantage and defeated the host of the tournament in a result 74:62.
S.Kozlov scored 19 points ( Moscow), whereas E.Lengvinas 29 points (Klaipėda).
In the last but one game, Vilnius ,,Tegra“ defeated the exhausted due to four overtimes representatives from Sweden (94:82), and in the final game in the other sport hall, Riga „Rumba/LSPA“ gained a victory against the tired basketballers from Moscow „You‘re On“ in a result 88:59

So, such a turbulent start of the tournament makes us to expect a great intrigue in this IABL season, as due to the newly joined competitative teams, the forecast of the total winner of the league will be complicated.