By Aris Barkas
An index rating of 31 from Dimitris Diamantidis, his season high performance, was enough for Panathinaikos to win against Maccabi Tel Aviv and for him to gain the play offs Game 1 MVP title. It’s a personal second best index rating in Diamantidis’s Euroleague career and his best index rating outside the regular season.
As a typical anti-star Diamantidis for one more time played the team card and denied that he is the leader of Panathinaikos (!) in a Euroleague TV interview. As he said: “I don’t believe that I am the leader of the team. Basket is a team game, it’s five against five and everybody plays the role that he is assigned by the coach. I just try to do my best every time, to do anything the team needs to win”.
His stats line on Tuesday was great with 15 points, 8 assists, 5 rebounds, 2 steals and 2 block. The best individual performance, thought, was that of Siena’s David Andersen (rating 33). The Australian was also the best scorer of the night with 28 points, but that was not enough for the Italians against Olympiacos and that’s the reason for Andersen missing the MVP title.