Barcelona come to Murcia at the wrong moment. They have two days' rest after a Euroleague trip to Istanbul, and three frontcourt players are out injured. Murcia have had a full week off and get to open their home schedule against a thin Barcelona rotation. With fresh legs at home, Murcia can attack the paint and the glass for forty minutes.
The official league injury report rules out Josh Nebo, Yoan Makoundou and Tosan Evbuomwan for Barcelona. That puts heavy minutes on the remaining bigs in a week with five games in fourteen days, and Zalgiris come to the Palau next.
Don't read too much into Murcia's opener. They lost 84-77 at Girona while shooting 26.7% from three, and two late threes decided it. A seven-point loss on a night that cold looks like a shooting slump, not a broken team.
This matchup was even last season. Murcia finished fourth at 25-9, a place above Barcelona, and won both regular-season meetings: 84-83 at home and 81-78 at the Palau. Barcelona's big wins in Murcia came in the playoffs, at the end of a long year. A rested Murcia team early in the season is a different game.
