AS Monaco put together the greatest three-point shooting night in club history in any pan-European competition to down FC Bayern Munich on Thursday night in Germany. Coach Sasa Obradovic’s men shot 12 for 17 from behind the arc en route to a 78-83 victory.
The team’s 70.6% success rate on threes made all the difference on a night where it was outrebounded (29-27), dished fewer assists (14-12) and committed more turnovers (9-11).
It was the best three-point shooting night of any team all season and tied its French League rival LDLC ASVEL Villeurbanne for the 17th best of all time. Monaco’s best three-point shooting night in the competition was when it made 8 of 17 (47.1%) against Anadolu Efes Istanbul in Round 11. The club record in the 7DAYS EuroCup is a 9-for-13 night (69.2%) against Unicaja Malaga in last season’s Top 16.
Six players got in on the three-point action with Mike James leading the way with 5 triples from 7 attempts, which was one fewer than his career-high. James has made 6 threes in a game six times in his career, including once this season.
There was one man who both coaches cited when talking about the three-point onslaught: Danilo Andjusic. He was perfect on 3 shots from downtown and finished the game with 16 points.
“We have guys who can shoot the ball,” Coach Obradovic said after the game. “Today if you gave Andjusic just a little space, he scored. This is a strength for this team. This is normal. If you play closed [on defense], if you stunt a lot and give us open looks, we scored almost all of those.”
Coach Andrea Trinchieri praised Monaco’s shooting and his team’s defensive effort, but he also chided the Bayern men for one major mental error.
“When I play against [Mike] James I always put, I’m ready for his 25 points. We played good defense, he scored very tough shots. The problem is that 16 points from Andjusic with 3 out of 3 three-point shots. It’s something that was clear in the game plan, we didn’t follow the game plan and this cost us the game,” said Trinchieri. “Don’t forget they shot 12 out of 17. One is our mistake. Andjusic is our mistake. The others were all contested.”
The others who made “contested” threes were Will Thomas (1 of 1), whose triple was the 100th of his EuroLeague career, Yakuba Ouattara (1 of 1), Brock Motum (1 of 1) and Alpha Diallo (1 of 4).
Together, it was a decisive three-point shooting display for Monaco, which improved to 3-2 under Obradovic, and could be primed to ride its red-hot shooters on a winning streak and a climb toward the playoff zone.
