By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Olympiacos finished the first round of Euroleague’s regular season unbeaten, defending champions Maccabi Tel Aviv got an important road win at Malaga, Crvena Zvezda was also impressive in Spain and EA7 Milano destroyed Turow in the last quarter.
Olympiacos is building a strong defensive identity and that was proven against Galatasaray. The final 93-66 score explains what happened on the court and the numbers are devastating. The Reds shot 70% in two pointers against 37% of Galatasaray, they had 26 assists and just 6 turnovers, producing their most attractive basketball yet.
In a very close game Maccabi Tel Aviv got the 70-66 win at Malaga as Devin Smith was more than crucial with one more double double (24 p., 10 r.). The hosts used Jayson Granger, he played despite battling injury woes and he finished the game with 1/10 two pointers and 1/5 threes. Those numbers in that kind of game were really important for the outcome.
In Vitoria, Crvena Zvezda got a valuable road win (86-66) over Laboral Kutxa thanks to a great defensive effort by the winners. Toko Shengelia with 6/14 shots and 20 points was the only double digits scorer of the hosts who had in total 3/20 threes. The guests were in control from the first half with a partial 20-12 score in the second period and Laboral Kutxa just couldn’t much their energy. Luka Mitrovic with 17 points was the top scorer of the winners. As it was announced after the game, coach Marco Crespi was released by Laboral Kutxa.
In Milan, EA7 Milano thanks to a big final quarter with Joe Ragland scoring 20 points and Alessandro Gentile adding 19 stormed feisty Turow and got the 90-71 win. During the last ten minutes of the game the partial score was 32-14 for the hosts who needed an explosion like that in Euroleague in order to get also a moral boost.