Olimpia was a little bit rusty early in the game, especially at the defensive end of the floor, struggling to make stops and getting down by 11, 17-6. Then, gradually, entered in the game, fixed the defense and improved on offense. The second half was much better and allowed Milano to win its 8th straight game, 89-71. The third period was crucial, Olimpia was its dominating self defensively, but scored also 30 points, putting its hands on the game. Sergio Rodriguez had a monster shooting night. His threes generated the comeback in the second quarter and allowed Olimpia to get away in the third and never looked back. He made eight out of 10 on top of his six assists (he has 25 in his last three). Zach LeDay added a 12-12 night and had also four assists, Shavon Shields prolonged his streak of double-digit games, reaching eight. Olimpia shared the minutes among eleven players, Gigi Datome was not available, including Kevin Punter, who was out since late September, and Riccardo Moraschini, who came back after a two-game absence. “We came off a tough week, we didn’t practice and we paid for it, especially our first quarter defense, who allowed everything, dribble penetrations, by Jaime Smith mostly. Once we fixed our defense everything improved, the second half was better, we allowed 14 and 13 points respectively in the third and fourh quarter, and our ball circulation was better. It’s good that we gave some minutes to Kevin Punter and Ricky Moraschini,” Coach Ettore Messina said at the end. Olimpia made 11 out of 22 threes and had 23 assists.