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Two other teams from last year's Final Four joined the champion of that event as exclusive group leaders after Week 6 of the Euroleague regular season finished on Thursday. Defending champion Panathinaikos remains the only undefeated team in the competition as its defense undid host Fenerbahce Ulker 64-83 on the road in Istanbul, Turkey. Sarunas Jasikevicius paced the Group C leaders with 19 points. The Greens' title-game opponent last season, CSKA, took over first place in Group A with a gutsy 76-85 road win that ended Tau Ceramica's 30-game home streak reaching back to January, 2005. David Andersen and Trajan Langdon pumped in 23 points each for CSKA. A thriller decided the new owner of first place in Group B as Unicaja fought off a late rally by visiting Lietuvos Rytas to prevail 71-69 in Malaga, Spain. Carlos Cabezas drove for the game-winning layup with 2.5 seconds left to raise Unicaja's record to 5-1. L. Rytas fell to second place, where it joins Aris TT Bank, a 67-64 winner against visiting Efes Pilsen, and Maccabi Tel Aviv, which prevailed 81-82 on a put-back by Terrance Morris with 4.5 seconds left. Second place in Group C belongs solely to Real Madrid, whose 104-73 blowout win over Chorale Roanne lifted its record to 5-1, Olympiacos, a 90-74 home winner against Zalgiris behind 32 points from Arvydas Macijauskas, and Montepaschi Siena, which rolled 59-84 at Prokom Trefl Sopot, share second place in Group A.
 CSKA Moscow ended Tau Ceramica's Euroleague-record home floor winning streak with a convincing 76-85 victory at the Fernando Buesa Arena in Vitoria, Spain. David Andersen and Trajan Langdon stepped up with 23 points apiece for the injury-riddled Russian champion, which was without four of its most important players – Theo Papaloukas, Ramunas Siskauskas, Matjaz Smodis and Aleksey Savrasenko. Tau had won 30 consecutive Euroleague home games dating back to January 2005 when it lost to the same CSKA team, though Andersen and J.R. Holden are the only CSKA players to take part in both games.
Olympiacos moved into a three-way tie for third place in Group A by zooming past Zalgiris to a 90-74 victory. Arvydas Macijauskas scored 32 points to pace Olympiacos, including 5 in a row as the Reds broke open what had been a close game late in the third quarter. Macijauskas's point tally was his best in nearly four years since posting 40 against Asvel Basket in December 2003. He now leads the league in scoring this season with 23.8 points per game.
Montepaschi Siena dominated Prokom Trefl Sopot 59-84 on Wednesday in a matchup between the Italian and Polish champions. Montepaschi finished the opening period on a 2-13 surge and never looked back. With 4 blocked shots, Siena center Ksistof Lavrinovic cemented his Euroleague-lead in that category with 13 this season and 2.17 per game.
Dewarick Spencer led Virtus VidiVici with an MVP-type effort as the club broke its four-game losing streak in Group A by downing Union Olimpija 101-91. Spencer paced VidiVici with 34 points on 7-for-8 two-point and 5-for-9 three-point shooting, 8 rebounds and 7 assists for a 44 index ranking, which saw him earn MVP of the Week honors.
Carlos Cabezas's basket with 2.5 seconds remaining broke a tie and lifted Unicaja to the top spot in Group B by edging Lietuvos Rytas 71-69 in one of the most intense regular-season in recent memory. L. Rytas trailed by 9 midway through the fourth quarter, but Chuck Eidson led the visitors back and tied it with 8.6 seconds remaining only to fall to Cabezas's heroics. The win marked Unicaja's 11 straight Euroleague victory at home.
Cibona thrashed Le Mans Sarthe Basket by 20 points at the Drazen Petrovic Basketball Center in Zagreb, Croatia, on Wednesday night to improve to 3-3 in Group B. The 91-71 final score also left Le Mans winless in six tries this season. The victory was Cibona's first 20-point Euroleague win since December 2004, when the Croatian champs topped Prokom 88-57.
Aris TT Bank holds a share of second-place in Group B after holding on until the finish of a 67-64 victory over Efes Pilsen at home in Thessaloniki, Greece. Aris used a 15-0 run to turn the game around before halftime. Efes rallied to within a point, 62-61, with 30 seconds to play, but Aris finished off the win at the foul line. Jeremiah Massey was huge again for Aris with a double-double of 13 points and 13 rebounds.
Terrence Morris's follow-up basket with 4 seconds remaining lifted Maccabi Elite Tel Aviv to an 81-82 win over Armani Jeans Milano. The victory was Maccabi's first road win of the season and snapped a four game losing steak on the road. Morris scored 13 of his 17 points in the fourth quarter as the Israeli champs erased a 7-point deficit in the closing minutes. The game took place in front of five of the Milano greats that helped the club win the 1987 and 1988 Euroleague titles, beating Maccabi in the final each time.
One near-perfect quarter propelled defending Euroleague champion Panathinaikos to its sixth consecutive Group C victory as it derailed host Fenerbahce Ulker 64-83 in Istanbul. Panathinaikos is the only remaining undefeated team in the Euroleague at 6-0. The Greens have now won 10 straight Euroleague games dating back to last season and 15 of 16 overall. The Panathinaikos defense stopped Fenerbahce cold in the third quarter, outscoring the hosts 22-5. Sarunas Jasikevicius paced the winners with 19 points in 18 minutes.
Real Madrid bounced back from its first loss in Group C by downing Chorale Roanne 104-73 in the Spanish capital. It was the most points Madrid had scored in a Euroleague game since March 2002, when it beat Ural Great on the road 104-113. It also marked Madrid's largest Margin of victory in a Euroleague game since it pounded Hapoel Jerusalem 104-64 in December 2000.
 AXA F.C. Barcelona won its first road game this season by rolling past Lottomatica Roma 65-74. A virtuoso first-half performance from guard Gianluca Basile helped build a lead that Barcelona would not surrender thereafter. Barcelona outrebounded Roma 37-23. Another key for the visitors was keeping its former player and Roma playmaker Roko-Leni Ukic to his lowest output this season in terms of index rating.
The confidence Brose Baskets head coach Dirk Bauermann had in his team paid off as the German champs downed Partizan Igokea 78-62 for their first win of the season. Bamberg had lost several heart-breakers, but Bauermann continued to support his charges and follow the game plan. "We knew that all we had to do was to keep playing the way we had been playing and doing the same things we were doing and things would work out just fine,” Bauermann told Euroleague.net after the game. “The team just believed in itself and that was the difference."
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Friday, November 30, 2007
Euroleague.net
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