STRASBOURG (France) - SIG Strasbourg have advanced to the Round of 16 as the top team from Group A in the Basketball Champions League thanks to defeating UCAM Murcia by three or more points (82-70) to claim the head-to-head tiebreaker.

Turning point: Strasbourg led the entire way through the first half and held a slim 37-32 lead at halftime thanks to Marcus Keene's 12 points.

Thad McFadden scored 8 points in the third quarter to help Murcia outscore Strasbourg 22-21 in the quarter and get them within four points heading to the fourth quarter. Strasbourg pulled away in the final quarter thanks to opening up the quarter on a 13-2 run and stretching out their lead out to as many as 16 points, putting the stamp on their wire-to-wire victory.

Game heroes: Keene and DeAndre Lansdowne were the stars for Strasbourg, as the pair combined for 48 of the team's 82 total points.

Keene finished with 25 points, the most for him in a BCL game, and 4 assists on 9-of-18 shooting from the field and 5-of-11 from three-point (as many made threes as in his three previous games combined), while Lansdowne finished with 23 points, 5 rebounds, 4 steals and 2 assists on 9-of-13 shooting from the field and 2-of-4 from three-point.

The two players also combined to knock down 18 of Strasbourg's 32 total field goals and seven of the team's nine made threes.

Stats don't lie: Strasbourg shot the ball more efficiently than Murcia, converting 48.5 percent of their shots from the field and 39.1 percent from three-point compared to 34.5 percent from the field and 26.7 percent from three-point for Murcia.

Both teams committed 15 turnovers, but Strasbourg took better advantage and had a 14-3 edge in points from those turnovers.

Bottom line: Strasbourg improved to 4-1 in Group A and have clinched first place in the group as well as their spot in the Round of 16. The French club will close the regular season on Wednesday December 21 when they travel to face the already eliminated Falco Vulcano Szombathely (1-4).

Murcia fell to 3-2 in the group and were led in defeat by Travis Trice who finished with 17 points, 7 assists and 2 steals. The Spanish club will finish up their regular season on Wednesday December 21 in a road game against Tofas Bursa (2-3).

They said:

"We knew going into today that we had to play really, really good basketball to have a chance. We were able to do a lot of things that we've been talking about this week to allow us to get the win today. It's one game at a time and it's great that we got to advance, now we'll have some time to be able to continue growing. We're ready for the next round." - DeAndre Lansdowne, SIG Strasbourg

"It's a great feeling winning the group, secure the top 16 and finish the job that coach Lassi (Tuovi) started at the beginning of the season. Solid defense, good control of the rebounds, especially in the second half. It's good that tonight we found contribution from everybody and of course Marcus (Keene) and Dre (Lansdowne), they did a great job to lead the team with the win. When you play a game like this and your opponent has zero seconds to lead the game, that means something, despite it was not our best basketball." - Luca Banchi, Head Coach SIG Strasbourg

"We knew coming in that it would be a fight. We got off to a good start competing. They made a run toward the end that kind of led into them getting the win. It was a lot of little stuff that we have to work on, but we'll continue to fight and continue to put it together as a team." - James Anderson, UCAM Murcia

"I think we played well during some minutes. We had the mental power to come back two, three times in the game, but for me, the key was in the last part of the game, and they played better than us these last 10 minutes and we have to keep going in this competition and keep fighting." - Sito Alonso, Head Coach UCAM Murcia