Barça have lost at MoraBanc Andorra in a game were they were smothered by the home side in the first half, but fought back hard afterwards, albeit ultimately to no avail. With such a huge trip to Greece coming up, Roger Grimau did choose to rotate his bench considerably, but that was understandable. The games on Tuesday at 8.30pm CEST and Thursday at 6.45pm CEST are crucial for EuroLeague survival.
Rokas Jokubaitis took the reins in the first period, but Andorra always had an answer at led by four after the first ten minutes.
Three 3-pointers from Joel Parra got the blaugrana right back into contention, but the home side responded with an 8-0 streak, and with James Nnaji off for two anti-sportsmanlike action, major height was lost as Andorra started to put some light between the teams, By the break, things were looking decidedly unpleasant (55-43).
Fighting back
A 5-13 streak then pulled Barça back into the game. More brilliant long shooting from Parra was the plus side, but another disqualification, this time for Jabari Parker, further jeopardised things, yet going into the final period there was just one point splitting the teams.
The final period was a 3-point festival, but sadly it was mainly the Andorran attempts that were finding their mark, and the gap started to widen and widen again. Barça had lost their fire and Andorra did an expert job of playing out the remaining minutes (108-92).
MATCH STATS
MoraBanc Andorra, 108
Barça, 92
MoraBanc Andorra: Jean Montero (14), Jerrick Harding (20), Stan Okoye (15), Tyson Pérez (8), Felipe Dos Anjos (8), Mihajlo Andric (14), Rafa Luz (11), Tobias Borg (10), Nacho Llovet (0), Alex Madsen (0), Marin Maric (8), Adam Somogyi (-)
Barça: Tomas Satoransky (3), Darío Brizuela (13), Alex Abrines (3), Oscar da Silva (10), Willy Hernangómez (15), Nico Laprovittola (7), Jabari Parker (4), Nikola Kalinic (2), Rokas Jokubaitis (9), Oriol Paulí (2), Joel Parra (22), James Nnaji (2)
Periods: 28-24, 27-19 // 20-31, 33-18
Referees: Jordi Aliaga, Luis Miguel Castillo, Raúl Zamorano