Tomislav Mijatovic reveals that Shane Larkin had the flu vs. ALBA / News - Basketnews.com

Anadolu Efes Istanbul's head coach, Tomislav Mijatovic, revealed that Shane Larkin had the flu in a scoreless night against ALBA Berlin.

Credit: IMAGO/Seskim Photo TR Credit IMAGO/Seskim Photo TR

A EuroLeague phenomenon took place in Round 31 as Shane Larkin, the superstar of Anadolu Efes Istanbul, did not score any points in a narrow 85-84 win over ALBA Berlin.

Shane Larkin

MIN:32.19PTS:16.97 (57.82%)REB:2.97As:5.19ST:1.06BL:0.06TO:1.94GM:31ProfileEuroLeague2023/2024

In a post-game interview, the team head coach, Tomislav Mijatovic, revealed that Larkin was battling the flu, which affected his performance quite negatively.

"As you noticed, we had not an injury but flu with our captain [Shane Larkin]. So he was battling that," Mijatovic stated.

"He fought, tried and then the other guys stepped up. Tremendous effort at the end with the rebounds of Wil Clyburn, with the block shot of Tyrique Jones. Prior to that, all the guys [had] maximum effort. It was a team victory," the Croatian specialist continued, praising the entirety of the team for a strong effort on a night where Larkin remained scoreless.

While the Turkish-American guard struggled, Efes's other players stepped up. Elijah Bryant broke his career record by scoring 24 points and accumulating 5 rebounds as well as 4 assists. On the other hand, Will Clyburn, Rodrigue Beaubois, and Darius Thompson all scored in double digits, while Tyrique Jones dished out the game-winning block.

This was the first time since the Round 29 game against AS Monaco in the 2021-22 season that Larkin did not score any points.

In the winning effort versus ALBA Berlin, Larkin nevertheless had 3 rebounds and 2 assists in 14 minutes and 8 seconds.

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