Estonia's Henri Drell matches Spanish basketball league stats record
Estonian national team player Henri Drell made Spanish top basketball league history Saturday for his team Badalona Joventut.
Drell's plus-minus rating by the end of the match was +46, tying the all-time Spanish ACB Liga record set by former pro Victor Claver for Barcelona in the 2020–21 season.
Drell, who plays small forward, accomplished this by scoring 20 points in 22 minutes (five out of seven attempted 2-pointers, three out of four attempted 3-pointers, and one out of two free throws), along with four steals, three rebounds, and three assists. He was also awarded match MVP.
The performance also aided Drell's team in coming back from behind against struggling Granada, who initially surprised hosts Badalona by going 12 points up by the end of the first quarter, adding three more points at the start of the second. However, Badalona woke up in front of a home crowd, going on a 19–2 run to take the lead, and ultimately dominated the second quarter 37–11.
In the second half, their advantage only grew further still as the visitors continued to fade. They won the fourth quarter 36–17, and by the time the final buzzer sounded, Badalona had secured a convincing 109–73 victory.
Estonian national team small forward Sander Raieste, who also plays in the ACB Liga, also took the court Sunday, but his home team Murcia fell to Valencia 110–84 on the road. The Estonian played 14 minutes, tallying five points (2-pointers 1/1, 3-pointers 1/4), four rebounds, two steals, and two blocks — an efficient performance similar to Drell's, though Raieste's plus-minus suffered from the heavy loss, ending at -7.
Both Estonian players' clubs remain in playoff contention: Raieste and Murcia are fourth with 14 wins and seven losses, while Drell and Badalona are seventh, with 13 wins and eight losses. The two teams also face each other again on April 4. The ACB Liga regular season concludes on May 29.
A basketball plus-minus (+/-) rating is a statistic measuring a player's impact by calculating the, net point differential between their team and the opponent while that specific player is on the court. A positive number indicates the team outscored the opponent, while a negative number shows they were outscored
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Editor: Andrew Whyte, Kristjan Kallaste
