Barça 91-87 Virtus Bologna: Into the Euroleague play offs

An 91-87 victory for FC Barcelona against Bologna at the Palau sees them finish the regular season in the Euroleague in fifth place and lines up a tie against Monaco in the first round of the play offs. The blaugranes dominated the match against the Italians but were almost caught out by a fourth quarter surge from Bologna. 

Always ahead 

Barça started motivated in the Palau and there were soon 5-0 up in the contest thanks to Justin Anderson. Bologna settled into their game but were always playing catch up and the blaugranes ended the first quarter with a three pointer from Punter that put them 23-16 in front. 

Jan Vesely made his return from injury and Parra contributed on offense to allow Barça to stay out in front come half time at 45-38. 

Tight finale

In the second half Punter, Satoransky and Vesely combined to keep Barça in front. The Italians brought themselves to within three early in the third quarter but the blaugranes found another gear to lead 66-57 after 25 minutes. 

However, in the final quarter Bologna came to turn the score around and lead 78-76 with just six minutes remaining. The Palau crowd launched into action and spurred the blaugranes on to a valuable 91-87 win and a quarter final play off against Monaco. 

MATCH STATS

Barça, 91
Virtus Bologna, 87

Barça: Satoransky (11), Punter (20), Anderson (12), Parker (10) and Hernangómez (9) -starting five- Parra (10), Brizuela (10), Fall (-), Abrines (-) and Vesely (9) 
Virtus Bologna: Pajola (-), Cordinier (11), Clyburn (15), Shengelia (17) and Zizic (12) -starting five- Hackett (-), Morgan (5), Diouf (6), Akele (-), Holiday (16) and Polonara (5)