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| Vladimir Stankovic, Euroleague.net |
Veteran sportswriter and Euroleague.net collaborator Vladimir Stankovic has been following the best basketball on the continent longer than almost anyone journalist, writing for decades about the sport in major publications in both Serbia and Spain. For the new 2009-10 season, he offers a series of opinion blogs about what's happening on and off the court in the Euroleague.
Panathinaikos and CSKA Moscow, the two finalists of the last, unforgettable Final Four have started this season's Top 16 in very different ways. CSKA, the runners-up from Berlin, have a 3-0 record while the defending champs, Panathinaikos, are at 0-3. Probably nobody envies the situation of the Greens, but a similar situation in a not so far-away past gives Panathinaikos fans some hope. Also in the 2005-06 season, Panathinaikos started the Top 16 with an 0-3 record and finished... as group champ! Four years ago, the Greens first lost to Cibona 70-72, and later to Benetton by 69-76. The Greens also dropped the third game to Efes by 73-76. In the second leg, Panathinaikos won all three games - each by more points than it lost to the same opponent the first time - and thereby finished first!
I am not saying that we will see it again, but I am sure that PAO will fight for the playoffs while there are some mathematical options for them. And I agree with Coach Obradovic about what he said after the third loss in Barcelona last week: "In my 11 years at Panathinaikos, we have played 22 finals and won 19 titles, but I don't know where it's written that we must win every season." It looks like a big part of the faithful Panathinaikos fans think the same thing. Last week, after the Greens loss against Maroussi, several hundred fans went to the next team practice to show their support for the players and the coach. Love must show when times are hard.
Maroussi Month
A debutante in the Euroleague, Maroussi has defeated four Euroleague champs (three former ones, and the defending champ) in the last month! In the final game of the regular season, they punched their Top 16 ticket face-to-face against Maccabi Electra. Once in the Top 16 , they defeated Panathinaikos and then Partizan. Between those last two, in a Greek League game, Maroussi also defeated Olympiacos, which is otherwise undefeated in its last eight Euroleague games. In other words, these are glory days for head coach Georgios Bartzokas and his players.
Maroussi is the first Euroleague team ever to reach the Top 16 starting from the qualifying rounds, where they kicked out time-honored clubs like Aris and Alba Berlin. Meanwhile, the career of Coach Bartokas is the second shortest among all the Euroleague's bench bosses. This young coach - born June 11, 1965 - was training Olympia Larissa three years ago, then he was assistant coach at Maroussi for a year. Last summer, his opportunity arrived, and he is obviously making the most of it. Congratulations, coach!
A little history
I watched the Olympiacos-Cibona game on Croatian TV, with commentary by Veljko Mrsic, a great former player of Cibona and several other European teams. Cibona lost by 3 points, missing the last triple to force overtime. The team from Zagreb is 0-3 in the Top 16, but in all three games have fought until the last minute always, and had options to win two of them. During the game, the TV announcers reminded the young Cibona fans that 25 years ago, Cibona won its first European title in the same Peace and Friendship Stadium in Pireaus, Greece. That triumphant day was April 3, 1985 when Cibona defeated Real Madrid by 87-78 thanks to 36 points by the late Drazen Petrovic, who played 39 minutes. His brother Aleksandar didn't even leave the court, playing all 40 minutes and scoring 16 points. The best rebounder on that team was Cibona's current sports director Mihovil Nakic, with 11 boards, but even more impressive were his 8 blocks! Andro Knego, recently named general manager of Cibona, added 10 points. On the Madrid other side was the late Fernando Martin, with 14 points. Another curiosity: two of that year's finalists are now basketball journalists: Zoran Cutura of Cibona had 16 points in the final and now writes for Jutarnji list of Zagreb. Juanma Lopez Iturriaga of Madrid, who had 15 points in the final, now writes for El Pais and also comments for Spanish TV channel La Sexta.
That game from 25 years ago has nothing in common with the competition we know today, but every once in a while I think it's not that bad to look into the past. I believe in the saying: "He who does not have a past will not have a future either."
And speaking of history, while the Euroleague is off next week as several national cups take place, the 52nd anniversary of the first game in the history of European club competition will be marked. It was on February 22, 1958 that Brussels Royal IV and Etzella Ettelbuck of Luxembourg opened a new page in the history of the sport. For the data lovers, Royal IV won that historic opener 82-43.
The numbers
This week didn't offer any milestones, but the biggest numbers belonged to Montepaschi Siena's Terrell McIntyre. It doesn't happen every day that the team's best scorer, the second best scorer of the week, is also the best passer of the week. That's why McIntyre was not only the MVP of the Week, but won that honor with an index rating, 43, that proved the third-best in Top 16 history. Against Real Madrid, McIntyre scored 24 points and dished 11 assists. Of his 24 points, he scored 18 through triples (6 of 9). Talking about threes, McIntyre is leading the way this season in the three-point shots attempts average (6.7 per game) and he is also the top player in the lsit for the best average of three-pointers made, 2.7 per game. McIntyre, 100% guaranteed.
A question for the end: Will J.R. Holden of CSKA Moscow and Gianluca Basile of Regal FC Barcelona the first ones to reach the 200-game mark in the Euroleague? For now, both of them are standing at 190, and they have three more guaranteed. If their teams make the playoffs, which looks more than likely today, they would have the theoretical chance to play five more and if they make the Final Four, they will have two more in store. That's another question for those who like betting.
POSTED BY
Vladimir Stankovic - Euroleague.net
DATE:
Saturday, February 13, 2010