IN THE GAME

It was a wild first week in this new Euroleague season. Wild – and entertaining, but not really the highest level yet on most courts. No surprise, it is only the beginning of the season, the teams need time to gel together, especially since it has been a busy transfer summer yet again, with not just players, but also a star coach [Ettore Messina] changing sides. No doubt, as the season unfolds, this competition is going to be extremely interesting. Just  a random list of my thoughts here.

THE BIG SHOT

The Victor Khryapa buzzer beater to start off the Wednesday action shouldn’t have happened from Maroussi’s perspective. Clearly a great, difficult shot in a high rainbow arc over the outstretched arms of the defender, unlucky for the Greeks that this one went in. However, the crossfield pass to a three point threat that is facing the basket with only about 7 meters of distance towards it shouldn’t have happened, and even if it did, he shouldn’t have had the time to get a good look at the basket and bring the ball up without someone directly in front of him. Dimitris Mavroeidis didn’t recover quickly enough from helping out on the inside. Anyway, a very good game [13 points, 9 rebounds, 3 blocks] for the young 1985-born center, who had already left a strong impression in the qualifying rounds. The same goes for his teammates: Maroussi had a very impressive, disciplined performance on both ends of the floor, executing the pick and roll clinically and creating plenty of open looks, which they had a bit of trouble converting – probably the only negative thing you can say about Wednesday’s performance. Never forget to put those performances into context: Maroussi is doing it with a mini budget, probably significantly less than two million Euros overall.

CSKA meanwhile looked quite chaotic, and it is frightening to see this team, which has kept most key players from the Messina era, playing unorganised, undisciplined basketball, relying mostly on one-on-one skills. That’s not good enough for club like CSKA. What it is good for: to illustrate the influence of coaching.

IMPRESSIVE EARLY SEASON FORM

Meanwhile, we witnessed a spectacular highlight-reel show in Barcelona. This is what happens when you let them play, Ricky Rubio, Juan Carlos Navarro, Victor Sada and crew will pick you apart with spectacular passing. The boxscore suggests that it was a bit of a one-man-show by Pete Mickeal on Wednesday in Istanbul, but that really wasn’t the case, he was just quite often on the receiving end of crisp passing moves – 21 of Barca’s 29 field goals were assisted. Ricky Rubio finished his first Euroleague game for Barca with 9 dimes. As for Fenerbahce, they looked overwhelmed and unable to play together. Willie Solomon and Lynn Greer might have put a few points on the board, they always will. But that’s hardly an indication of good play for the Turkish side, who Gordan Giricek and Emir Preldzic combined for 1/13 for.

If there was a price for being the best team of the early season, Barcelona would probably win it, with Montepaschi Siena following as runner up. Siena crushed Cibona 85:40 on their home floor on a day when Cibona’s US duo Jamont Gordon/Antonio Graves had trouble bringing the ball up court against the tenacious Siena defense. Terrell McIntyre finished with only 6 points, but 11 assists and 7 steals.

THE REST

Elsewhere, both Greek giants started off with victories, Olympiacos winning by 22 at home over helpless Orléans, and Panathinaikos deciding the game in Milano deep in the fourth, when Dimitris Diamantidis, who had a rather subpar game apart from the closing minutes for his high standards, provided a late spark with a tip in and a steal plus layup. Two Spanish losses as Real Madrid fell to Khimki in overtime despite Darius Lavrinovic’s 32 points, 11 boards and 3 blocked shots [Carlos Cabezas led the winners with 20 and several key plays], and as Caja Laboral suffered a surprisingly heavy loss in Rome. The fourth team, Unicaja, won in Pionir Arena behind several fourth quarter key shots by Joel Freeland. Meanwhile, Lithuania got off to a great start, with Rytas beating overspending Efes and Zalgiris crushing ASVEL. EWE Baskets Oldenburg won in Gdynia in a game full of errors and tactical incapabilities, played at a pace of 81,28 possessions per team – that’s higher than last season’s average NBA pace. The difference is: in the NBA they know how to play that way effectively.

THE YOUNG GUNS

What started this summer at Eurobasket seems to translate over into Euroleague play. Youngsters are making an impact, and Wednesday and Thursday brought us several performances we shouldn’t ignore:

• Rytas shooting guard Martynas Gecevicius [born 1988 and a standout for Lithuania on youth level] had 22 points on 8/12 shooting [5/8 from three point land]. Is he finally living up to the expectations? This young Rytas team certainly offers him a chance to shine.

• Another Lithuanian, Martynas Pocius [born 1986], had 16 points, 3 rebounds and 3 assists in Zalgiris’ victory over ASVEL. Mantas Kalnietis [1986 as well] led the hosts with 17.

• Partizan faceup-PF Branislav Djekic, a 1991 born youngster who played well at the side of very much hyped big man Dejan Musli in the U18 Eurobasket last summer, had a somewhat unexpected 10 points on 3/5 shooting [2/4 for three] against Unicaja. He also added 2 assists.

• A trio of well-known point guards – Ricky Rubio, Milos Teodosic and Nick Calathes – had solid performances to open the new Euroleague season. Rubio had 9 points and 9 assists in Istanbul, Teodosic had 7 points versus Orléans, and Calathes contributed 5 points on 2/5 shooting in 17:55 minutes of playing time.

• Young Georgian Panathinaikos center Giorgi Shermadini [born 1989] got significant playing time on Thursday – 12:21 minutes; 2 points, 2 rebounds, 2 blocks – but showed he still has a lot to learn. From his colleague Nikola Pekovic [17 points, 6 rebounds] for example.

• Tomislav Zubcic went to 2/11 from the field but still was one of the better Cibona players. 1991 born Zubcic, a widely known prospect after playing in several youth tournaments for Croatia as well as participating in the 2009 Nike Hoop Summit, added 8 boards and a steal. Great to see him log big minutes this early.

• Aldo Curti [1987] had 9 points and 4 assists in Piraeus. On the other side, point guard prospect Kostas Sloukas played more than five minutes after the game had already been put out of reach.

• Oguz Savas was one of the few bright spots in Fenerbahce’s game. He scored 11 points on 5/7 from the field. His teammate Omer Asik, coming off an excellent Eurobasket, was considerably quiet, adding 6 points and 3 boards while continuing to display his biggest flaw – free throw shooting [2/7 on Thursday].

• Timofey Mozgov [1986] had 10 points and 6 rebounds versus Real.

• Joel Freeland [1987] had 19 points in Belgrade, including several key jumpshots late in the fourth quarter.

ATTENDANCES

Attendances were a bit disappointing. Vacant seats in Belgrade, Kaunas and Vilnius? And Fenerbahce fans were obviously in front of the TV instead of in the arena, since the football team played in Bukarest at 7 PM. As for the Olympiacos crowd: I thought I was watching an NBA game. It was THAT silent.

STATISTICS

As you may have noticed, I have recently fallen in love with pace statistics, since I believe controlling the pace of a game is one of the keys to win a game. No team is able to go slow and fast as if it didn’t matter for them. In the future I will compare a team’s pace in a particular game to the team’s usual pace, maybe we can draw some conclusions. After only one gameday, there is no average team comparison data yet, but lets have a look nevertheless: I took the data from last season, well aware though that coaching and roster changes throughout the offseason have a big influence on playing style. AV.PS/G is the possession data from last season, PS/TEAM is the possession data [all possessions according to the formula divided by two] for the respective Euroleague game, DIFF is the margin.

*Projected on 40 minutes

If you wonder why there is no point zero or point five in the possessions, as it should be when dividing by two [teams]: the possession formula is only an estimate, since the boxscore doesn’t tell us the exact number of possessions. The problem is with the free trow attempts: for example, five free throws can be the result of two possessions [foul on a three pointer, foul on a two pointer], but also three possessions [andone, two free throws, two free throws], in extreme cases even four or five. Hence, the formula applies an average factor to free throws attempts.

For boxscores, visit Euroleague.net.