Turkey beats Spain 63-60 to remain undefeated at European basketball championship

Turkey beats Spain 63-60 at Eurobasket

LODZ, Poland — Turkey remained undefeated at the European basketball championship Saturday with a 63-60 victory over Spain, the world champions who are led by NBA stars Pau Gasol and Rudy Fernandez.

Turkey forward Ersan Ilyasova scored 15 points and made a key block in the closing seconds of the second-round game.

Spain had the ball and a chance to win with 12 seconds to play. Sergio Llull drove to the basket, but Ilyasova got a hand on the shot and teammate Ender Arslan rebounded. Center Semih Erden then hit two free throws to seal the Group F win.

“We saw that Turkey put in four big men and we had quite a good penetrator in Sergio Llull,” Spain coach Sergio Scariolo said. “He beat his man and had a clear advantage.”

Gasol, the Los Angeles Lakers center, and Fernandez, a Portland Trail Blazers guard, scored 16 points apiece. Turkey is led by Hedo Turkoglu, now with the Toronto Raptors.

In another Group F matchup, Oklahoma City Thunder center Nenad Krstic had 18 points and eight rebounds to send Serbia to a 77-72 victory over host Poland. Jaka Lakovic scored 24 points to carry Slovenia past Lithuania 81-58.

Turkey tops Group F, followed by Slovenia and Serbia. Turkey next plays Serbia on Monday. Slovenia faces Poland, and Spain takes on Lithuania. The top four teams in Group E and Group F advance to the quarterfinals.

Serbia took control early in the second half with a 13-0 run, sparked by Nemanja Bjelica’s dunk and capped by Milenko Tepic’s 3-pointer, to lead 56-40. Poland pulled to 64-62 in the fourth period on a layup by Lukasz Koszarek but came no closer.

Marcin Gortat of the Orlando Magic and Koszarek each scored 16 points for Poland.

“I think that for a young team, that is not so experienced, this game was a very big task,” Serbia coach Duzan Ivkovic said. “There was a lot of support for the Polish team. I think we controlled the game very well, and I think our defense was at a high level.”