By Lefteris Moutis
During summer of 2011 the bets for the team that would finish first in the Turkish league was more unpredictable than ever.
Efes Anadolu spent more than $ 20 million to gather the best players of the market. Fenerbahce/Ulker spent about the same amount of money making transfers of similar value. Besiktas seemed to be coming to the forefront with huge transfers like Deron Williams, Carlos Arroyo etc.
Galatasaray was ambitious and achieved the goal of qualifying to Euroleague groups, but begun with theoretical disadvantage the championship behind the other three rivals.
Although, they had the best results of all Turkish teams in Euroleague and won the regular season first time after 43 years! Nothing happened by coincidence. Oktay Mahmuti had a great coaching plan in his mind, picked useful but not star players (Jaka Lakovic, Jamon Lucas, Joshua Shipp etc.), took advantage of everyone and finished to the summit. His big bet of course is winning the championship, first for Galatasaray since the distant 1990!
Two games before the formal end of the regular season the positions in the playoffs have been decided. Like that Tramzonspor and Bantirma are relegated.
The playoffs series
(1) Galatasaray–Tofas (8)
(2) Banvit-Aliaga (7)
(3) Efes Anadolu-Pinar Karsiyaka (6)
(4) Besiktas-Fenerbahce/Ulker (5)