Rostock (dpa/mv) – One thing will be certain late on Sunday evening when the first Hanseatic city duel in the basketball Bundesliga between the Rostock Seawolves and the Veolia Towers Hamburg is history: the winner of this clash can decide about the end of a negative series in the BBL look forward. Newly promoted Seawolves have suffered five defeats after a surprisingly strong start with four wins. The guests from Hamburg have lost four times in a row, and in three of these four games they also conceded more than 100 points.
Despite this record, Seawolves coach Christian Held stated: “Hamburg is playing very good basketball at the moment.” He referred to the appearance of the guests last Tuesday in the Eurocup. Although the Towers were also unsuccessful on the international stage, Held emphasized: “They lost with five points in Trento to a very good Italian team, which is currently fourth in the Italian league.”
Another aspect is that the Towers, like his team, have had to struggle with failures in recent weeks. “They’re just not complete and could only play with parts of the squad. But we expect both McCullum and Childs to be back against us.” A comeback by Kendale McCullum might be inconvenient for the Rostockers. The American had given the Seawolves a headache three years ago in ProA, when he was still active as a playmaker in Paderborn.
Held, on the other hand, was recently able to train with the entire squad again. Nijal Pearson, who spent a long time in the USA due to a family bereavement, has returned. Finland international Elias Valtonen makes his home debut after wearing the Seawolves shirt for the first time at the game in Oldenburg last week.