European Champions' Cup Play-Offs 1973-1974

A difficult and hard-fought victory for Real Madrid in a final held in the city of Nantes, not very brilliant in terms of quality of play but terribly exciting and uncertain from start to finish. Despite the fact that Ignis dominated the scoreboard for most of the match, Carmelo Cabrera's departure to the track was the turning point that allowed the white team to change the course of a match in which they seemed to be heading for defeat due to the great performance of the great Dino Meneghin.

The first minutes of the match were of clear Italian superiority. With both teams defending individually, Ignis began to open up a gap on the scoreboard (6-12, min. 3) because their point guard Ossola was clearly winning over Vicente Ramos, and above all Dino Meneghin (5 baskets of 5 attempts in the first ten minutes) was openly winning the game in attack against his pair Rullan until he was completely off center. After the Ignis achieved a maximum advantage of twelve points (10-22, min. 6; 20-32, min. 13), Ferrandiz knew clearly where the problems came to his team, and ordered a change in the defensive allocation between Luyk and Rullan - so that the first went to take care of Meneghin and the young Balearic center of Bisson - while Cabrera replaced Vicente Ramos, unable to stop Ossola. These changes strengthened the Madrid defence, which until then had only worked in Brabender's marking of Raga. The entry of the Real Madrid Canarian base was like a breath of fresh air for his team, and with his imaginative and effective direction of play the Madrid team managed to cut the difference in the score to leave it at 34-39 at half-time.

The Whites continued their comeback after the restart, until finally Cabrera got the basket that equalized the score (64-64, min. 31). From that moment on, Real Madrid began to take off, thanks to an extraordinary Carmelo Cabrera, who would end up sinking the hopes of Varese. The canary was the wedge that closed any crack in the defense of his team in addition to dry Ossola, which managed to break the pace of the Italian game. His stealing of the ball sunk Ignis morally, and he also completed some extraordinary shooting percentages. When Cabrera was eliminated for five personal fouls in the 38th minute (with 78-74 on the scoreboard), his replacement, the young Corbalan, brought guile and serenity to Real Madrid, who won a tight but fair final victory.

Courtesy of BasketFinals

Real Madrid - Ignis Varese 84-82
Real Madrid CF (coach: Pedro Ferrandiz): Vicente Ramos, Wayne Brabender (193-SF-1945, college: Minn.-Morris) 22, Walter Szczerbiak 14, Clifford Luyk 14, Rafael Rullan 14; Carmelo Cabrera 16, Juan Antonio Corbalan 4, Cristobal Rodriguez dnp, Vicente Paniagua dnp, Luis Maria Prada dnp
Ignis Varese (coach: Sandro Gamba): Aldo Ossola 4, Manuel Raga 17, Bob Morse 24, Iwan Bisson 10, Dino Meneghin 25; Marino Zanatta 2, Dodo Rusconi, Sergio Rizzi dnp, Paolo Polzot dnp, Massimo Lucarelli