Off-target Ireland ship heavy loss in Croatia

The Irish were outclassed in the opening game of the third round of the Eurobasket pre-Qualifiers.

TOUGH LOSS: Ireland head coach Mark Keenan. Pic Credit ©INPHO/GEPA Pictures/Mathias Mandl

Croatia 89 Ireland 49

IRELAND were always facing a big gulf in class in this opening game of the third round of the Eurobasket pre-Qualifiers in Croatia but put themselves on a hiding to nothing with their disastrous early shooting.

The home side were ranked 25th in the world, 71 places higher than the Irish and also at home but they were noticeably without their NBA stars and clearly took their foot off the gas after racking up half a tonne by half-time.

And even though Croatia’s ultra-physical man-to-man defence gave Ireland little chance to catch their breath, there was just no excuse from some of the dire early shooting from Mark Keenan’s side.

Ireland managed just five points in the entire first quarter, shooting a lamentable 14% from the floor to trail 5-24 after the opening 10 minutes.

When the Croats racked up a string of five successive three-pointers on the re-start it was game over.

They led 56-17 at half-time by which time they’d sunk 10 of 15 three-point attempts, compared to just two from 17, scored by CJ Fulton and Matt Treacy.

Only Irish-American seven-foot debutant Neal Quinn could make any inroads in the first half, getting up inside the boards to rack up eight of his 12 points and finishing as the only Irish player to hit double figures.

Ireland finally got stuck in, winning the third quarter 16-14 to trail 33-70 and only losing the fourth quarter by three points (16-19) when they finally started to front up on attack and drive into the paint.

Lorcan Murphy (nine points), Jordan Blount, Fulton, Neal, Conor Quinn and Paul Dick led the fightback and Taiwo Badmus had a couple of dunks in his seven points but, by his usual standards, the Iceland-based player had a very quiet night.

So too did captain John Carroll but it was his first game back after a second cruciate injury.

There was little Ireland could do at times against the passing speed and phenomenal consistency of outside shooters like Roko Badzim or Toni Perkovic or the inside threat of Bayern Munich seven-footer Danko Brankovic.

But there really was no excuse for some of the earlier bricks and missed inside shots from a wide range of players and final shooting stats of just 42% from two-point range and scoring just five of 32 three-pointers.

“We dug a massive hole in that first quarter but we had to forget about the score at half-time and I think we lost that second half by a point,” coach Mark Keenan said.

“At half-time it wasn’t all about this game, it was getting our mindset right in the second half for the next phase of it (qualifying).”

Ireland face Luxembourg next Wednesday before a pair of home games against Croatia (July 29) and Luxembourg (August 5), all of which will be broadcast live on TG4.

Top-scorers:

Croatia: R Badzim 18, T Perkovic 17, R Prkacin 14, D Brankovic 11.

Ireland: N Quinn 12, L Murphy 9, CJ Fulton 8, T Badmus 7.