Panathinaikos’ first loss of the season grabbed the headlines in Round 6 of the EuroLeague. But there was plenty more to talk about.
A string of dramatic finishes, another Olympiacos discovery, and some eye-catching numbers…
Welcome to another edition of the EuroLeague Notebook.
Who Can Predict Anything Anymore?
I have a confession to make – I put Pablo Laso in my Fantasy team ahead of Anadolu Efes’ clash with Bayern.
Efes barely led at any point in that game. They never stood a chance.
So, naturally, the first thing I did before the next round was sack Laso from my Fantasy team. Just in time for the trip to Kaunas.
And then – Efes led virtually from start to finish and cruised to an 85–70 win at one of the toughest venues in Europe.
So much for trying to predict the EuroLeague.
Hapoel hadn’t exactly impressed through five rounds, despite winning three games. Then they went to Athens and beat Željko’s Panathinaikos.
Micić did an excellent job of running the team, while LeDay shone against his former coach.
Nail-Biting Finishes
Following the EuroLeague often feels like a workout for your remote control. This round was no exception.
Maccabi have actually started to look like a team over the past week, and they deserved their win in Valencia despite some foolish mistakes down the stretch.
Earlier in the double week, Olympiacos erased a 28-point deficit in Valencia. Now Beşiktaş nearly threw away a lead of exactly the same size at home against Bayern. Alimpijević’s men survived the scare, but another adjustment period awaits with Lonnie Walker’s arrival.
Meanwhile, Olympiacos needed overtime in their second game in Spain as well – and won again, this time 105–100 in Barcelona.
“How Do They Keep Finding These Guys?” – Mbaye Ndiaye
The sample size may still be small, but Mbaye Ndiaye looks like another example of Olympiacos’ smart recruitment.
He rebounds, defends, fits seamlessly alongside the stars and makes an impact without demanding the ball. The 27-year-old Senegalese forward has demonstrated all of those qualities in the early stages of the EuroLeague season.
At Palau Blaugrana, he was outstanding with 17 points, seven rebounds and three blocks.
After three seasons with ASVEL, the 203cm forward has hardly come out of nowhere. It is also true that he has improved year after year. But few could have expected him to make such an immediate impact in Piraeus.
“How do they keep finding these guys?” one of my colleagues asked.
Speaking of pleasant surprises, it was hard not to enjoy Gonzalo Corbalán‘s performance for Valencia. Whenever the Argentine guard was on the floor, things seemed to go well for his team.
Whether he can reproduce performances like that is another question, but the energy is certainly there. Keep an eye on him.
Numbers That Stand Out
– 14 blocks! Fenerbahçe set a new EuroLeague single-game record with an astonishing 14 rejections against Partizan. Marcus Bingham accounted for five of them. There wasn’t much for Šarunas Jasikevičius to smile about in that game, but this particular stat might have done the trick.
– Six out of six. Milano have struggled since the start of the season, and when things go wrong, problems tend to pile up. Dwayne Bacon can score in bunches, but deadly three-point accuracy has never really been his calling card. Before the game in Milan, he had made just four of his 16 three-point attempts this season. Against Poeta’s team? A perfect 6-of-6.
– Eight triples for Feliz. That wasn’t even the highest number of made threes in the round. Andrés Feliz went 8-of-11 from beyond the arc in Real Madrid’s victory. Under Pedro Martínez, he has continued the trend from last season – he becomes more important to Real with every passing day. Some thought the arrival of Nick Smith might reduce his role. They were wrong, to put it mildly.
– The Ante Žižić revival. Nobody talks much about Ante Žižić these days, but he’s starting to look like the player many once expected to dominate the EuroLeague. The years have passed, and defensive shortcomings remain, but through six rounds he is averaging 9.8 points and 6.5 rebounds while shooting a remarkable 81.5 percent from the field.
– A rough night for Valančiūnas. Žalgiris were outscored by 21 points during Jonas Valančiūnas’ 19 minutes on the floor. His highest-scoring performance through six games remains the season opener against Crvena zvezda, when he scored 13 points.
– Four in a row. Crvena zvezda and Virtus have both put together four-game winning streaks.
