BRATISLAVA, Nov. 24 (Xinhua) -- After conquering last year's runner-up Prievidza on Wednesday, Lucenec overcame reigning champion Bratislava 87-73 at home in the 12th round of Slovak Basketball League on Saturday.
Bratislava is going through a rough patch after being eliminated from the FIBA Europe Cup earlier this week and now losing its second match of the season. Lucenec built up a 20-point lead at one time and capitalized on 13 three-pointers. American Mike Caffey put up another strong performance for the home team, keeping his scoring average well above 20 points per game.
Levice is slowly getting back on a winning track. The Patriots defeated Handlova on the away game 76-71, earning the sixth victory out of the last eight matches. The key to their success turned out to be the third period in which the visitors won by 11 points. Slovak international Viktor Juricek managed to sink several tough shots from a medium distance and led the Patriots' scoring with 22 points.
Lucenec's and Levice's wins pushed Zilina down to fourth place in the rankings as it lost to Svit 94-85. Zilina has been struggling with sickness going around the locker room lately and only seven players came to practice during the week.
Despite a great night by two Slovak nationals Robert Rozanek (23 points) and Jakub Meress (19 points), Zilina failed to keep Svit from turning up the offensive heat in the second half of the match. Svit won its sixth match of the season and is slowly climbing up the rankings, currently holding the fifth spot out of nine. Enditem
