By Panos Katsiroubas/ info@eurohoops.net
The Magnifying Glass focuses its attention on all the courts of Turkish Airlines Euroleague and each week examines through its basketball lens some of the games that stole the show in Europe’s top competition!
Delaney and Draper made it happen for Lokomotiv!
A great game took place in Krasnodar with Lokomotiv Kuban hosting – and in the end defeating – Panathinaikos Athens with an offensive outbreak in the fourth quarter. The home team stepped on the court with a lot of intensity on offense as well as on defense. Georgios Bartzokas’s team pressured the ball well and didn’t allow their opponents to circulate it, while on offense Anthony Randolph had a warm start, shooting from mid- and long-distance, with Panathinaikos‘s centers unable to follow him to the perimeter. The entry of Nick Calathes and Vladimir Jankovic gave the visitors some momentum. With pressure, steals and good defensive positioning, they limited Lokomotiv’s offensive game and scored easy points in transition.
At the same time, they took advantage of every mismatch in Lokomotiv’s switching defense, especially with James Gist and Miroslav Raduljica, who contributed points but also created for their teammates from the post. Jankovic scored 12 points on 5-for-5 shooting in that period, Calathes had 5 assists and Panathinaikos produced a 12-36 run that converted Lokootiv’s 12-0 start into a 24-36 lead for the Greens. The end of the half looked like its beginning, with the hosts improving their defense, making steals and scoring easy points. Overall, they improved their defense a lot in the third quarter and they confined Panathinaikos to 12 points in only 3 shots on target and 4 free throws. In the fourth quarter, wth the scoreboard close, the two teams presented a different approach on offense. Lokomotiv opened up the court and handed the ball to Malcolm Delaney and Dontaye Draper. With a screen on the ball, they tried to make the defense start switching and after the screen they went to a clear isolation game against the defense.
Panathinaikos tried to get the ball in the post, with Raduljica and Dimitris Diamantidis trying to score or, through the circulation of the ball, create open shots from the inside out, something they accomplished, with Antonis Fotsis making 3 shots in a row. The negative thing for Panathinaikos was that they couldn’t contain – not in the least – the outbreak of Delaney and Draper, who scored 6 three-pointers and a total of 19 points in the fourth quarter that essentially decided the game. In fact, Draper accomplished his best offensive performance in the Turkish Airlines Euroleague. It was a great win for Lokomotiv and one that makes them an even more powerful contender for the two top spots of the group.
The defense provided the win in a rock-and-roll game
What a great game we witnessed in Vitoria! In a literally rock-and-roll game with the two teams laying their souls on the court, Laboral Kutxa Vitoria Gasteiz, with their amazing defense as their weapon of choice, managed to prevail 81-71 over CSKA Moscow. They kept Dimitrios Itoudis’s team down to 71 points when before this game they had almost 93 as an average. It’s no coincidence that Laboral has the second-best defense in the Euroleague in terms of points conceded per possession. Because Laboral plays at a very high tempo, however, this isn’t always reflected in absolute figures. From the start, the hosts made their intentions clear and essentially dismantled every offensive system of CSKA in the first quarter. Its 10 points are the worst offensive performance for Itoudis’s team this season. In the second quarter, CSKA turned the game around through its defense, with Kyle Hines doing a great job at switching, but as did he and his teammates at blocking the lanes to the basket.
Only Darius Adams could take advantage for Laboral, whenever he found those lanes open, which wasn’t often. In the second half, the game became even tougher. Laboral’s defense on Milos Teodosic was amazing. Fabien Causeur mainly, but also the big men on switches, kept their arms up all the time so the Serbian star couldn’t find the time or room to execute. He found some lanes and finished some plays through penetrations, but in general, he never found the rhythm he had in previous games. Many times he was forced to go to the baseline, simply throwing the ball in order for it not to go out of bounds. He finished the game with 18 points and 5-for-13 shooting, while he had 7 assists and also 3 turnovers. For Laboral, apart from their good defense, they had important players on a good day and a pretty good circulation of the ball, which allowed them to strike at all the defensive weaknesses of their opponents.
Causeur and Ioannis Bourousis did a great job on the offensive end. The Greek center returned to his great form, finishing with 19 points and 13 rebounds. He scored a lot in the post while he had a clear mind to find his open teammates whenever CSKA’s defense sent backup help to guard him. Causeur, Laboral’s captain, was excellent in an all-round performance on both defense and offense, contributing in every department. A great job, especially on defense, was also done by Adam Hanga and Tornike Shengelia. CSKA renewed many attacks through offensive rebounds but were off-target from the perimeter with only 6-for-26 in three-point shooting. The home team had 10-for-23 and that surely played its role in the game.
Justin Doellman laid Real Madrid out
In yet another amazing clasico in Madrid, we witnessed a game that turned into a thriller. And the thriller was won by the team that had the momentum of getting back into the game at that particular moment, in this case FC Barcelona Lassa, who came back from a 16-point deficit and won the game with a buzzer-beater by Doellman, who, in general and with consistency, was the visitors’ best player. The game was purely a matter of rhythm. As long as the pace was high and the game opened up in terms of possessions, Real Madrid dominated. When the pace dropped, the possessions were fewer and the game was limited to five-on-five, that’s when Barcelona got back into the game. Doellman had a warm start to the game with shots from the perimeter, either following a screen on the ball, or after circulating the ball well, scored 8 of the first 10 points of his team. The entry of Sergio Rodriguez and Sergio Llull completely changed the image of the game.
“El Chacho”, especially, played like he was possessed. Nobody could stop him by marking him individually and he served a lot of ready baskets for his teammates. He finished the game with 18 points and 13 assists and he was the main reason for the 18-0 run that turned the initial 2-10 into 20-10. Llull was introduced from the bench and made 3 three-pointers. Madrid’s defense on Ante Tomic was excellent, while along the perimeter, too, they got excellent defensive stops from K. C. Rivers and Jeffery Taylor. The deficit reached 16 points for the visiting team (48-32) and no one could imagine what followed in the second half. That’s when Barcelona – their foundation being their good defense but also Stratos Perperoglou’s amazing performance, scoring 13 points, all of them in the third quarter – turned the game around and made it a derby once again. Of course, to do this also took the amazing presence of Pau Ribas and Tomas Satoransky.
The two of them played some great defense along the perimeter, making it very hard for Madrid to circulate the ball, while they also stopped Madrid’s transition game. They did an amazing job on offense as well, penetrating Madrid’s defense and distributing the ball out to the wings for open shots, as they were also the exclusive operators of the amazing ball circulation that the visitors had in the second half. They might have scored only 11 points, but they had 14 of Barcelona’s 23 assists. Madrid’s defense always cut inside the paint with the players from the wings offering assistance, but they left open Barcelona’s shooters in the corners, on the weak side as well as on the strong side, and they paid for it with Doellman and Perperoglou scoring 9-for-12 three-pointers.
Shane Lawal made his best appearance in this year’s competition, both on defense and offense, and covered for Tomic’s quite mediocre night. In the end, Pablo Laso and Xavier Pascual added their coaching touches. Neither of them trusted their team’s defense, committing fouls and asking for the ball on offense at the end. A missed free throw by Felipe Reyes forced Madrid to play defense, Doellman faced Gustavo Ayon on the switch, made a quick stop-and-pop move to get open, and gave his team the win. A very important win that keeps Barcelona close to the frontrunners in Group F.
An advertisement for basketball!
One of those games that bring more people to the arena and make more fans love basketball took place in Volkswagen Arena! Fenerbahce Istanbul had a great start in the game offensively, guided by Bobby Dixon, who got the ball in the basket in any way he wanted! The American guard managed to score 15 points in 5-for-6 three-pointers in the opening 8 minutes of the game, some of those from way downtown. He was the main reason why Zeljko Obradovic‘s team scored 37 points in the first quarter and 62 by halftime! In fact, the 51-62 score of the first 20 minutes, with its 113 points in total, is a new record in the Euroleague in terms of the offensive output in one half! In the second quarter, Jan Vesely and Ekpe Udoh picked up from the where Dixon left off and dominated under both baskets. Semih Erden tried to bring some balance, but didn’t have any support, while Luke Harangody also provided solutions for Darussafaka Dogus Istanbul. The home team stepped on the court looking more aggressive in the second half, trying to press on the ball more and shorten the spacing for the opponent’s attacks.
Jamon Gordon took initiatives in offense, Harangody kept scoring, but the problem was this for Darussafaka: Fenerbahce adapted, they aimed for the paint and Vesely and Udoh kept doing damage. Oktay Mahmuti’s team found themselves behind 73-86 at the start of the fourth quarter, but didn’t give up. From 73-90 at the 32nd minute, the home team had a 23-6 run in the next 7 minutes and closed down the gap to 96-100, a minute before the end! They took advantage of the mental slackness of Obradovic‘s players, forced them to commit turnovers, scored in the open court and also struck close to the basket systematically, something that they hadn’t done until then. It’s telling that, at the finish line, Darussafaka had 19-for-25 shots from inside the paint. A three-point play by Luigi Datome (96-103) essentially sealed the win for Fenerbahce in a game that offered up 206 points and came near the ultimate record of productivity in the Top 16, which is 217, from a Ural Great-Real Madrid game that had ended 104-113! Fenerbahce proved yet again the quality in execution and the talent they have on offense. They had 64% in two-point shooting (25-for-39) and 55% in three-point shooting (11-for-20).
Darussafaka were slow to react but at least they never gave up but fought with Harangody, Erden, Gordon, but also Emir Preldzic and Ender Arslan. Finally, it’s worth noting that we enjoyed a game in which 11 players scored a double-digit number of points and that, yet again, Vesely got a double-double with 16 points, 13 rebounds and an performance index rating of 30!