Over the past two seasons, Le Mans Sarthe Basket (MSB) had maintained a dominant record against Cholet Basket (CB), securing five consecutive victories. This included three league matches, as well as quarter-final wins in both the Leaders Cup and the Coupe de France 2025. This impressive streak has now been decisively broken.
Cholet Basket led for almost the entire game, demonstrating remarkable accuracy from beyond the 6.75m line with 15 successful three-pointers out of 33 attempts. The team also dominated the rebound battle, grabbing 44 boards compared to Le Mans’ 32. Mohamed Diarra delivered a standout performance, nearing a double-double with 14 points and 9 rebounds. Johnny Berhanemeskel’s 23 points for Le Mans ultimately proved insufficient to secure a victory.
Fabrice Lefrançois, the head coach of Cholet Basket, shared his thoughts with Le Courrier de l’Ouest:
“This victory is thoroughly deserved, given the dynamics of the match. For me, it was built much earlier, right from the preseason preparation. Having already defeated them in a friendly match might have ‘unlocked’ something, proving to us that we were indeed capable of it. I have a special thought for our supporters, because this success is incredibly important to them. When we manage to make the people of Cholet happy, then I am happy. This series of defeats wasn’t an indelible scar, but it was certainly painful. We could have won the first leg in November. So tonight, we are very content. And it is deserved because we were ahead for almost the entire game. Against MSB, rebounding was one of the essential keys to the match, a major lesson learned from last season where we had been outmatched in terms of impact.”
For Le Mans, the prolonged absence of Wilfried Yeguete is keenly felt, while Jonathan Jeanne was only able to play for a mere 4 minutes in the match.
