By Panos Katsiroubas/ info@eurohoops.net
The magnifying Glass focuses its attention on all the European courts and each week it will choose to examine through its basketball lens some of the games that stole the show in the top competition! We present you five games of the week and here you can read what happened at FC Barcelona Lassa clash against Panathinaikos Athens.
Game with lots of tactics from the bench
A thrilling game took place in Moscow where CSKA Moscow had a tough time but in the end defeated Brose Baskets Bamberg 83-77. In the first 20 minutes, Dimitris Itoudis’s team played amazing defense, switching on every screen and limiting Bamberg‘s collaborations to a minimum, pressing on the ball and making it tough for their guests to execute. The German team scored just 28 points, with only 3 assists, before halftime. On offense, the home team relied heavily on two-on-two play and on-the-ball screens. CSKA scored constantly with penetrations through the defensive switches, with the main protagonist being Nando De Colo, who finished the half with 16 of his total 22 points. However, CSKA couldn’t bring off the collaborations they had in their first two games, as Andrea Trinchieri’s players successfully closed down spaces and passing lanes. From its average of 25.5 assists in the first two games, CSKA dropped to 16 in this one.
Starting midway through the third quarter, Bamberg also loosened up on offense and made up a 15-point deficit (53-38) to take a lead of 68-69 with 4 minutes left to play. The visitors did this through three strategies: first, they closed the lanes into the paint for CSKA’s guards; on offense, they struck at the weak links after CSKA’s switches created mismatches; and they opened up the court through their defense and scored in transition. In the end, Bamberg couldn’t manage to win the game because of Itoudis’s smart defensive changes in the final 4 minutes. He chose a zone defense tailored to shut off the middle lane. That’s where Bamberg succumbed to two mistakes and one offensive foul. On offense, CSKA opened up their game in width and through transitions. The hosts got their last 12 points from Nikita Kurbanov (5 points), Andrey Vorontsevich (5) and Kyle Hines (2), who were crucial and led their team to victory.
Laboral close to perfection
Laboral Kutxa Vitoria Gasteiz made a spectacular appearance against Limoges CSP, demolishing the French champs in their own home with an imposing 71-107 score. The first half was right out of a fairytale for the players of Velimir Perasovic. His team scored 60 points, getting baskets from all 10 players that stepped on the court. In this period, Laboral shot 69% accuracy on two-point field goals, 42% on three-pointers, and boasted an unbelievable assist-to-turnover ratio of 17 to 1! We are literally talking about the perfect game! The team from Vitoria circulated the ball amazingly well, had perfect timing in their passing, either in pick-and-rolls or on the weak side. Laboral played some great defense, too, making 8 steals and scoring 20 points in transition in the opening 20 minutes. Limoges managed to make its presence felt for only 5 minutes in the third quarter, narrowing the gap from 34 points (38-72) down to 20 (55-75). The rest of the game, again, belonged to the visitors, who dominated and extended their lead to 36 points. Laboral finished with 17 steals. The last time Laboral Kutxa scored this much was on Feburary 25, 2009 in Milan. On that occasion, the Basques defeated Milan 74-107.
Revenge is a dish best served cold
Five months ago, in the Turkish Airlines Euroleague Final Four semifinal in Madrid, Real Madrid prevailed over Fenerbahce Istanbul 96-87. On Friday, Fenerbahce got its revenge, beating Pablo Laso’s team in Istanbul 77-66. The game leaned to the side of the Turkish team for three reasons. First of all, Zeljko Obradovic‘s team played good defense. Spearheaded by Ekpe Udoh, Fenerbahce’s defense looked very tough only a week after allowing 91 points in Strasbourg. The American center contributed in the switching defense, helped out with double-teaming on the screens along the wings, and most importantly, closing down the lane to his team’s basket, making 3 blocks and forcing Madrid’s players to take difficult shots. Secondly, Madrid’s players made bad choices on offense, playing hastily and not reading the mismatches well.
Some plays involving Gustavo Ayon were characteristic, as in the instance when he used on-screen switches to assume position in the post facing Bogdan Bogdanovic, but still his teammates didn’t get the ball to him. There were many such plays throughout the game. Furthermore, the Spanish seemed to be executing its offense with almost no planning and a lot of improvisation and instinct. With 20 offensive rebounds and a fast-paced game, Real Madrid‘s 66 points was a disappointing performance. The third reason for Fenerbahce’s win was a sheer will to get it done, and the fact that several of its players had good days. Aside from Udoh, Bogdan Bogdanovic, Gigi Datome and Baris Hersek offered important offensive solutions. The strong on-the-ball screens from Obradovic‘s players gave Fenerbahce’s perimeter players the opportunity to always be a step ahead of the defense and to have options to either attack the basket or pass for open shots. Overall, it was a fair win.
Credit to Unicaja for its endurance!
For yet another game Unicaja Malaga played some excellent basketball and proved itself perhaps the most positive surprise in this year’s Euroleague. Unicaja’s third victim was Darussafaka Dogus Istanbul, which yielded to the superiority of Joan Plaza’s team. On the offensive end, the Spanish team was impressive, especially in the first 30 minutes. Unicaja spread out the offense throughout the entire length and width of one side of the court, making some wonderful collaborations, with all the players always seeking the best option even if they had an open shot. Stefan Markovic was the orchestrator, pulling apart every defensive system of Oktay Mahmuti’s team, and serving up easy baskets to his team’s big men through pick-and-rolls. The Serbian guard finished the game with 9 assists and now has an overall average of 7 assists in three games.
In general, Unicaja wreaked havoc inside the paint, scoring 42 out of their 81 points there. The Spanish team showed awesome range and reading of the game, accumulating 24 assists among 31 shots, in contrast to Darussafaka, which finished the game with only 13 assists. Unicaja got double-digit scoring from five players, with Edwin Jackson leading the way with 18. Darussafaka possesses some good material but has a problem facilitating things.It’s telling that after three games the Turkish team has a total of 47 assists and 48 turnovers. The average of 16 turnovers is not a good sign either, and in games like the one against Unicaja – which turned the ball over only 6 times – the defeat and the large deficit are a logical consequence.
A playoff-quality game in Milan
It was an amazing finale of the Round 3 at Mediolanum Forum, with Olympiacos Piraeus getting a big win against the hosts EA7 Emporio Armani Milan. It was a game with lots of alternating leads in the score. The team of coach Giannis Sfairopoulos had small lead for most of the game, thanks in part to pick-and-rolls and Patric Young’s good finishes as their main axis, but also with Georgios Printezis consistently making good plays in the post. For the first time this year, Olympiacos tried to aim at the post and score points through the ‘5’ position, using Young’s good positioning inside the paint. The American center also did a great job with his aggressive hedge-outs on defense, which slowed down Milan’s ball circulation. He also collected some important rebounds, scored 18 points, denied passes inside the paint, and overall had a great game.
EA7 Milan’s big protagonist was Alessandro Gentile. The Italian star had some excellent moves on screens away from the ball and created the spaces he needed to execute. He also passed the ball very well on screen-switches, and was a constant threat for Olympiacos. He scored 24 points and had 7 assists, participating in 41 of his team’s 66 points. When he was on the floor together with Krunoslav Simon, they caused even bigger problems for Olympiacos with their good reading of the game and mismatches, and the duo scored from the perimeter as the Reds reacted badly in close-out defenses, especially from the weak side. At that point, with Olympiacos making one turnover after another – and16 in total – Milan overturned the 41-47 score with a 19-7 run to take 60-54 lead. In the final minutes, however, coach Sfairopoulos’s players tightened up their defense, made use of Printezis, who scored 8 points in the final 3 minutes, and scored some big shots – the one from Vassilis Spanoulis being the most crucial – to run away from Milan with a big win.