A Navarro-led Regal FC Barcelona is the new Euroleague champion after turning the championship game into an offensive and defensive clinic in the first half and going 12 for 28 on three point shots while blocking 8 shots throughout 40 minutes of play. Here’s my take on Sunday’s championship game in Paris.

The Final: Regal FC Barcelona vs. Olympiacos Piraeus 86:68
With co-contenders Panathinaikos and Real Madrid out early, this was quite the logical Final of this Euroleague season, and the place was buzzing with expectation. The game didn’t disappoint, starting off on a fast pace and plenty of scoring from both sides, before the inclusion of Fran Vazquez proved to be an early game changer in favour of the Xavi Pascual’s team.

First Half: In order to limit Sofoklis Schortsanitis who Olympiacos is always looking for in the post early on, Pascual put Boniface N’Dong into the starting five in place of Terence Morris, going with Erazem Lorbek at power forward. N’Dong worked hard but conceded his second foul at the 6:40 mark early in the opening quarter, leading to the inclusion of Fran Vazquez. Shortly thereafter, Victor Sada, unused by Pascual in the semifinal, replaced the inconsistent Ricky Rubio. Up to this point, it had been a free-scoring affair, highlighted by a couple of drives by Milos Teodosic right around Navarro and Ricky Rubio in a much anticipated matchup between the league’s two best young point guards. In the end, the duel of Europe’s rising stars was hardly worth a footnote. After the inclusion of Vazquez and Sada, it was all Barcelona: Vazquez blocked four shots in the first half, Sada was marvelous on both ends of the floor, and Barcelona’s automatic ballmovement and shot-making did the rest: As the first quarter buzzer sounded, Barcelona was up by nine.

Olympiacos forced its way inside with either pure elegance, experience and craftiness (Theodoros Papaloukas), or pure power (the rest). Too often, Josh Childress and Linas Kleiza ran into a wall of long arms. Sada usually dropped deep off of Papaloukas to defend every Childress and Kleiza penetration, and Barcelona as a team was clogging the lane with bodies and having their excellent shot blockers build the second line of defense.

In the end, Papaloukas and Bouroussis kept Olympiacos from suffering a collapse in the second quarter, but even the former, in an inspiring Final Four performance, could never generate the ball movement to force the Barcelona defense into rotation and get his teammates open looks. His drives were isolated events. As was Bouroussis’ wild three pointer midway through the second quarter. 4 of the Reds’ 15 first half field goals were assisted, for Barcelona 11 of 18 were assisted, including 6 of their 7 successful three point shots.

Papaloukas’ scoring performance against Europe’s finest interior defense should be an example of how to drive against an elite shotblocker without possessing the necessary hangtime or above average athleticism. The guy is a master at changing speed and direction, then shielding the ball very well with his hands and even the rim to elude the help defense.

Second Half: Respect to Giannakis for pulling the right strings at halftime. The unusual backcourt combination of Scoonie Penn and Patrick Beverley re-ignited Olympiacos at the beginning of the second half, cutting the lead back to seven and even five behind a high intensity display, best summarised by Big Sofo’s dive on the floor for a loose ball. For a span of five and a half minutes, Barcelona looked intimidated, and their third quarter shotchart is well-documenting the lack of offensive rhythm and team action.

A filled green circle marks an assisted field goal. An unfilled green circle marks an unassisted field goal. A filled red circle marks a missed shot where an assist would have been credited, had it gone in. An unfilled red circle marks a missed shot where no assist would have been credited.

But midway through the third, a couple of key plays turned the momentum back in their favour: First, a foul out of frustration by Bouroussis on N’Dong’s dunk attempt led to an and1 play to get the lead back to 8. Second, a long three pointer by Sada off the dribble with the shotclock expiring, and it was back to the halftime margin of 11 points. Later in the third, Juan Carlos Navarro went hot with a shot only he may take on this Barcelona roster (a risky contested three pointer after he had just collected the offensive rebound), and a jaw-dropping running hook/finger roll hybrid over Beverley. Considering what Olympiacos had invested in the first five minutes of the second half, this turnaround in less than 40 seconds had to have some mental effect on the Greek squad.

The Reds indeed never recovered from this setback, scoring only five points in the next nine minutes whereas Barcelona was not scoring at will, but hitting occasional shots to successively build the lead up to 19 points midway through the fourth quarter. 11 points two minutes from time was the closest Olympiacos ever got thereafter. A late three point festival including shots from Basile and Lorbek finally closed the game at 86:68.

Player of the game: Juan Carlos Navarro 21 points, 5 rebounds, 3 assists, +10 p/m

I flirted with the idea of placing Fran Vazquez or Victor Sada here, but Navarro’s huge shots in the third quarter, when Barcelona was suddenly in desperate need for a change in momentum, were some of the biggest in the whole game. Olympiacos tried five different defenders on him, nothing worked. In the end, a deserving Final Four MVP title for Navarro.

Notable performances

Fran Vazquez 6 points, 2 assists, 4 blocked shots, +14 p/m
With four blocks on the defensive end, plus several excellent plays on offense (not just finishing as we expect from him, but also dishing a surprising extra pass to Mickeal for the and1 play) Vazquez provided a huge spark off the bench for Barcelona. He’d been excellent in the semifinals already.

Victor Sada 7 points, 3 rebounds, 3 assists, 2/2FG, +13 p/m
With Rubio struggling at the beginning of the third quarter in particular, Sada, having not played a single minute in the semis, came in to give a flawless display on both ends of the court. Unsurprisingly, he was second on the team in plus/minus, behind Vazquez. Hit a huge, morale-breaking shot in the third quarter to put an end to Olympiacos’ rally.

Theodoros Papaloukas 12 points, 3 assists, 6/8FG, -11 p/m
Another incredibly gutsy performance by Papaloukas, who tried to stop the bleeding in the second quarter but was largely alone out there. However, a rather subpar defensive display by the 33-year-old.

Pete Mickeal 14 points, 5 rebounds, 3 steals, 6/12FG, +11 p/m
Mickeal silently made it to 14 and 5, second highest Barcelona scorer. Played aggressive defense on Josh Childress, and, in my eyes won the duel with his fellow countryman. Even if he made a couple of questionable shot decisions. One of the more underrated players this Euroleague season? I’d have liked to see him on the All-Euroleague 2nd team.

Josh Childress 15 points, 6 rebounds, 3 steals, 5/12FG, -17 p/m
A solid statline, including a meaningless three pointer right before the final buzzer, is not showing Childress’ difficulties in finding a way through the Barcelona defense on Sunday. Both of his two point field goals were fastbreak buckets, whereas in halfcourt, he repeatedly ran into the wall of Barcelona defenders underneath the basket. 10/26 from the field in this Final Four, way under his usual scoring efficiency.

Linas Kleiza 13 points, 4 rebounds, 4 turnovers, 4/9FG, -8 p/m
A frustrating evening for Kleiza, who made his first shot (a three) but repeatedly ran into the Barcelona interior defense after that. He also turned the ball over uncharacteristically several times.

Erazem Lorbek 8 points, 2 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 blocks, +11 p/m
Don’t sleep on Lorbek. Despite unspectacular individual numbers, the Slovenian was one of Pasqual’s key players in both Final Four games, defending extremely well against Kleiza and Khryapa, while supplying lowpost presence and intelligent passing on the other end. Plus, his three pointers were falling.

Keys to the game: Ball movement was so much better on Barcelona’s part, and I extracted a few examples for that. Of course, if you just search long enough, you may find some scenes in any team’s favour, but I’m not trying to prove a point here. Just a couple of plays on both sides that, for me, kind of summed up the evening.

First, the extra pass. Barcelona had plenty of those. Vazquez, normally known as a pure finisher above rim level, had two surprising extra passes to Mickeal in the first half, and Victor Sada had an assist to Vazquez when he could have converted the alley oop pass himself. Let’s take a look at the first play, a high screen and roll involving Navarro and Vazquez.

Schortsanitis isn’t defending this pick and roll in the first place, way too much space for a deadly shooter and passer like Navarro to operate at the three point line.

The gap is open for the short bounce pass, presenting Vazquez with a scoring opportunity.

Vazquez could have attempted to take it hard to the rim as Olympiacos had been doing all game. Instead, he decided …

… to drop it off to the cutting Mickeal. Easy dunk for the American small forward. Looks simple.

On the other end, a similar situation with Milos Teodosic and Schortsanitis running the pick and roll, defended by Navarro and Vazquez.

The spacing isn’t quite ideal here, since Kleiza’s position is allowing Lorbek to drop inside a bit.

Teodosic fumbles the ball, causing four Barcelona defenders to collapse on him. Diving on the floor, he still manages to direct the ball to the rolling Sofo.

Sofo, with Lorbek behind him, sees the cutting Childress and Kleiza left and right. One option is an open three pointer for a deadly shooter, the other is a sure two points for Childress.

Instead of passing the ball, Sofo goes right at Lorbek, allowing Vazquez to recover and block the shot. The ball goes out of bounds off Vazquez, but another great scoring opportunity is wasted.

Apart from Papaloukas and Teodosic (plus the rarily used Vujcic), Olympiacos has players that if they look to score, they look to score. Kleiza and Childress are brilliant scorers obviously, but how often do you see Childress driving hard to the basket, and in the last seecond kick it out for an open three pointer? It is rare. Here, for example, …

Four players are collapsing on a Childress penetration. The spacing of Penn and Papaloukas isn’t ideal here, allowing Navarro to cover the passing lanes to both players, but Bouroussis is wide open at the top of the key. On the other side …

Four players are collapsing on Lorbek in the lowpost. Lorbek spots Vazquez at the free throw line.

Vazquez has the open jumpshot or could even drive it to the hoop against Papaloukas. But instead, he makes another pass to Mickeal …

Papaloukas is caught on the wrong foot and fouls Mickeal on the layup – and one.

Taking it to the rim has been a key concept in Olympiacos’ game this season, the team with the 3rd highest free throw attempts per field goal attempts ratio and 2nd to lowest 3 point field goal attempts per field goal attempts ratio. Going aggressively right at the shotblocker is probably a strategy we all blindly accepted as the right one before the game. But that’s exactly what they did – they drove “blindly” at Vazquez, Lorbek and N’Dong. Only Papaloukas was able to challenge the shotblocker in the truest meaning of the word. His lowpost spinmove against Vazquez was a perfect example of that.

Speaking of keys to the game, Barcelona, as Partizan did on Friday, managed to limit Olympiacos’ transition game, which was was really reduced to a couple of fastbreak layups by Childress. Barcelona is often held mistaken for a fast team. They do like to push the ball when Rubio is on the court and Navarro certainly has the habit to fire one or two shots early on the clock, but overall this is a slow team on the vertical axis. The speed of execution in the halfcourt game itself is very fast of course, as you’ll hardly see a player dribble the ball for more than two seconds without progressing the play. In the end, it was a game of 68 possessions per team, very close to Barcelona’s average pace (68.5 possessions/40min) and far away from Olympiacos’ usual pace (74.5 pos/40min).

As for perimeter defense, this is certainly one of Olympiacos’ weaknesses. The old Papaloukas and young Teodosic both aren’t good defenders, lacking in quickness a little bit versus guys like Juan Carlos Navarro.

Additionally, Olympiacos guard Scoonie Penn found some pretty harsh words for the loss:

I think they had better chemistry than us today, and that also made a difference. We need to regroup now and learn from this loss, because the season is not over.

Key team statistics: Offensive and defensive rating is points scored and conceded per 70 possessions, not per 100 possessions.

Plus/minus stats: The stats may be a bit misleading in this case, considering Barcelona outscored Olympiacos by a considerable margin in the final 1 1/2 minutes when nobody was defending anymore and the outcome had already been decided. However, they nicely illustrate Sada’s and Vazquez’ (who both weren’t on the field anymore at that point) phenomenal games on Sunday.

Olympiacos was able to establish defensive intensity with Beverley on court, who really fought hard on defense, for example forcing Rubio into a turnover.

Shot charts:

BARCELONA | OLYMPIACOS

Ps: Am I the only one who thought that Xavi, Puyol, Bojan and Pique (sitting courtside) looked like the Hobbits?

After an ugly first half between Barcelona and CSKA, the first semifinal caught pace in the second half on Friday, before Olympiacos and Partizan had an epic battle for the second finals spot. Now it’s the well expected Barcelona versus Olympiacos on Sunday. Here’s my attempt at breaking down both semifinals with observations, plus/minus-statistics and quarter-by-quarter shot charts.

Regal FC Barcelona vs. CSKA Moscow 64:54
It was an incredibly nervous start for both teams, throwing the ball out of bounds, shooting bricks on good looks uncharacteristically and thus providing an ugly first half in front of an only half-full arena in Paris-Bercy.

From Barcelona’s part, some of it may have been strategy. Having identified the short rotation as CSKA’s main weakness, Pascual sacrificed offensive rhythm for lowpost pressure on the two CSKA key players Siskauskas and Khryapa, and it paid off in the long run: Mickeal drew two early fouls on Siskauskas and Khryapa left the game with his third foul with 6:07 to go in the second quarter. Without one of the two key guys, CSKA is not the same team. It is well documented by the in this case very telling plus/minus-stats.

CSKA on the other hand tried to use Planinic’s size advantage over Ricky Rubio in the post, but the Croat missed all of his four first quarter shots. After coming back from an early 2:9 deficit, Barcelona took the lead for good in the second quarter on a couple of pull up three pointers by Jaka Lakovic and Juan Carlos Navarro in the side pick and roll, with the still rusty-looking Matjaz Smodis not showing up in time to contest the shots.

A much more short-lived contest evolved in the second half, with Trajan Langdon in particular making shots from mid- and long range, going 3 for 6 from the field in this period, including 2 for 3 from beyond the arc. Barca meanwhile found into an offensive flow as well, finally driving the ball to the basket.

In the fourth, another worthwhile performance by Ramunas Siskauskas was overshadowed by the great decision- and shotmaking of Rubio and Erazem Lorbek. Both Rubio and Lorbek hit dagger three pointers in the closing minutes, putting away CSKA for good and making it to the Euroleague finals as the first ACB team since 2005.

Player of the game: Ricky Rubio 10 points, 4 rebounds, 8 assists, 3/6FG%, +18 p/m
It wasn’t a faultless performance for Rubio, who had an average first half but eventually came to life in the second. Rubio hit two three pointers from the very same spot to improve his season ratio to 36 percent, as well as creating Erazem Lorbek’s dagger shot two minutes from time. He did look troubled at times guarding the taller Zoran Planinic in the post, but Planinic failed to capitalise.

Plus/minus: Looking at plus/minus statistics for the game, it comes as no surprise to see Rubio and Lorbek as Barcelona’s top performers. With the backups on point guard and power forward on (Jaka Lakovic and Terence Morris), the team didn’t click this time.

For CSKA, Siskauskas’ outstanding performance is well covered by plus/minus as well: CSKA was +3 in almost 32 minutes with the Lithuanian assaassin on the court, -12 in a little over 8 minutes that he sat on the bench. This goes well in line with the season-plus/minus-numbers, which credit Siskauskas with the fourth highest net rating in the whole league.

Shot charts: Click for for full-sized quarter by quarter shot charts. A filled green circle marks an assisted field goal. An unfilled green circle marks an unassisted field goal. A filled red circle marks a missed shot where an assist would have been credited, had it gone in. An unfilled red circle marks a missed shot where no assist would have been credited.

BARCELONA SHOT CHART | CSKA SHOT CHART

Olympiacos Piraeus vs. Partizan Belgrade 83:80 OT
In a hard-fought battle in an intense atmosphere, Olympiacos survived an admirable Partizan performance to finally pull away in overtime.

Partizan started the game off with a bang, outhustling and outrunning Olympiacos for a quick 10:2 lead. Giannakis’ men looked for Sofoklis Schortsanitis early on with mixed results, sacrificing offensive rhythm but getting shotblocker Slavko Vranes into foul trouble. Josh Childress had an underwhelming first half, finishing with 1 for 5 from the field at the interval while most of the offensive load had been carried by the outstanding Theodoros Papaloukas.

Partizan could have been well in the lead after 20 minutes, had Aleksandar Rasic made two or three of his five wide open three point shots, but we’ve seen it many times: The guy is terribly inconsistent.

Instead, a truly remarkable performance by Bo McCalebb in the second half was matched by a great display by Kleiza and Childress’ comeback in the fourth quarter. While Childress was driving past the now visibly tired Vesely with ease, Milos Teodosic (0 for 6 from the field in the fourth) had his own ideas, well-documented by Olympiacos’ fourth quarter shot chart:

A late three by the excellent Kecman from exactly the same spot as twice earlier in the game brought Partizan level before another Teodosic turnover and resulting fastbreak layup by McCalebb put them in a great position to win the game. But Childress dunked an ugly airball by Teodosic home for the tie. McCalebb’s potential gamewinner from the wing missed badly.

Better free throw shooting by the Reds and the failure to collect the defensive rebound (Partizan utilised the zone late) was the story of the overtime, but Partizan had a great chance to tie it at the end, with McCalebb and Bozic eluding the intentional foul and the latter getting a clean look on the left wing, but the shot bounced off the back rim.

Player of the game: Theodoros Papaloukas 10 points, 5 assists, 3 steals, 4/7FG%, +9 p/m
A marvellous point guard performance by the veteran Papaloukas kept Olympiacos in the game. Papaloukas, turning 33 today, knew what he had to do all along, keeping the Reds in the game with his scoring early while settling for his role as floor general later on, as Schortsanitis, Kleiza and Childress caught fire. Papaloukas has been Olympiacos runaway plus/minus leader all season long, and Friday was no exception.

Plus/minus: The aforementioned Papaloukas on top for Olympiacos, followed by Bouroussis who was excellent in overtime in particular. Scoonie Penn didn’t play much after his slow first quarter start. As for Big Sofo, using his lowpost qualities excessively rarely pays off in terms of team production, but he can bring the opponent into foul trouble.

Kecman led the way for Partizan with +5 in a little less than 29 minutes. Is Rasic the scapegoat for Partizan’s defeat? Partizan left quite a few points on the way they should have taken when Rasic missed those three pointers, but we cannot ignore the fact that the team was still outscoring Olympiacos 24:22 with him oncourt.

Shot charts: Click for the full-sized quarter-by-quarter shot charts.

OLYMPIACOS SHOT CHART | PARTIZAN SHOT CHART

Notable performances
Erazem Lorbek: 7 points, 9 rebounds, 2 assists, +14 p/m
Lorbek’s allround skills were on full display as he put his mark on the game with solid decision-making and a timely three pointer late in the fourth. He was a constant threat to draw fouls on Viktor Khryapa and did a magnificent job on defense as well against former teammates Khryapa and Smodis.

Fran Vazquez: 11 points, 6 rebounds, 5/6FG, +11 p/m
Solid as ever, Vazquez took what was given to him and finished with a typical 5 for 6 from the field. The mobile big man is shooting over 67 percent from the field over the course of the season.

Ramunas Siskauskas: 19 points, 5 rebounds, 5 assists, 8/15FG, +3 p/m
One year after his epic 29 point performance versus Barcelona, Siskauskas had another monster game, finishing with 19, 5 and 5 while having his team outscore their opponents 49:46 while he was on the court.

Sasha Kaun: 9 points, 10 rebounds, 4/7FG, -4 p/m
Kaun was extremely aggressive early on, finishing several plays on dunks before Barcelona brought in Vazquez and N’Dong to put a body on the 25-year-old. A fitting performance by Kaun to cap his breakout Euroleague season in front of several NBA scouts.

Josh Childress: 17 points, 5 rebounds, 5/14FG, -4 p/m
Childress was unlucky in the early going but sparked Olympiacos’ comeback in the fourth quarter by driving to the hoop repeatedly and finishing Teodosic’s miss 2.6 seconds from time. Was 0/5 from downtown but 7/8 from the charity stripe.

Linas Kleiza: 19 points, 11 rebounds, 6/13FG, +2 p/m
Kleiza did something I didn’t necessarily expect from him: He let the game come to him. The Lithuanian didn’t have a whole lot of scoring opportunities in the first quarter but those opportunities presented themselves in the second half, when Kleiza made use of his strong physique to drive to the basket repeatedly.

Bo McCalebb: 21 points, 4 assists, 4 steals, 7/15FG, -2 p/m
A magnificent, gutsy, heroic performance by Lester “Bo” McCalebb, who went down injured after landing awkwardly after a fastbreak slam but came back to almost put Partizan into the final. The young US-guard was simply everywhere, working extremely hard on defense and posing all kinds of problems to the Olympiacos defense with his slashing abilities.

Jan Vesely: 13 points, 10 rebounds, 4 assists, 6/10FG, -10 p/m
With the world watching, Vesely came up with an extremely mature performance, managing his fouls (one of his major weaknesses up to this point), picking his spots carefully, passing the ball very well while forcing Childress into a subpar first half performance.

The midrange shot: Art nobody wants to see
The midrange game is dying. And nobody wants to save it. Maybe when the new 6.75m-arc is placed into the arenas, but it is rather unlikely. Developments in the NBA are going into the same direction, albeit slow, as in Europe: With the progress of what we might have called advanced statistics five years ago, it became shockingly clear that a long two pointer is not a good shot. Even if a skilled player shoots a truly impressive percentage on midrange fadeaway and the crowd loves it, it’s highly unlikely he’s so good that taking this shot (unforced) is justified.

Most of the top European teams have developed their gameplan towards taking shots from the high percentage areas in effective field goal percentage: The inside and the three pointer. These shots not only have a great chance of bringing direct points, they also generate the most offensive rebounds. A missed long two pointer is a lot less likely to generate an offensive rebound. The following chart is cumulating all shots that Barcelona, Olympiacos and Partizan players took on Friday.

The exception was CSKA, a team that combined for 32.35 percent shooting from the field versus Barcelona to sum up what has to be described a chaotic offensive display.

Note that while most of Barcelonas midrange shots were created by an assist, most of CSKA’s midrange jumpers weren’t. Trajan Langdon and Ramunas Siskausas might be among the top midrange shooters in the league, but the excessive shooting hoisting of the unassisted midrange shot is generally a bad sign in European basketball.

I did extended previews with an emphasis on statistics for each of the Final Four participants (click here for CSKA, Barcelona, Olympiacos, Partizan) some time ago, but still wanted to contribute a semifinal lookahead before CSKA and Barcelona tip things off in the early evening of May 7th in Paris. I am trying to find a balance here between providing interesting stuff for those that are already comfortable with all four teams, but also addressing readers from the Northamerican continent, who make a large portion of visitors on this site, but may not be used to all of the names that will show up in Paris next Friday.

MAY 7TH, 18:00 CET: CSKA vs. BARCELONA

Overview In a Berlin 2009 rematch, CSKA Moscow is facing the dominant team of the season, Regal FC Barcelona. One year ago, Ramunas Siskauskas almost single-handedly eliminated Xavi Pascual’s team by scoring 29 points in a little over 24 minutes, most of those in a thrilling second half. While CSKA not only needed to deal with the departure of the great Ettore Messina to Real Madrid, the effects of the financial crisis also pushed them off the throne as Europe’s richest ballclub. Even if the consequences weren’t as harsh as for city rival Dynamo, CSKA GM Andrey Valutin had to live with the the departure of Erazem Lorbek, Europe’s newest superstar as confirmed by a magnificent Eurobasket performance for his home country Slovenia, and the smart and sharp-shooting power forward Terence Morris to – quite ironically – Regal FC Barcelona. The CSKA roster had to be thinned down a bit, and the result is a seven man rotation, with young guys like Anton Ponkrashov unable to manage the expectations. Still, after a slow start, steady improvement, a lucky draw as well as outstanding performances by the Langdon/Siskauskas/Khryapa-trio cleared CSKA’s path to the Final Four.

It has been different for Barcelona, who have been performing a flawless basketball season from day one until today, losing just five of so far 56 games in ACB, Copa del Rey and Euroleague combined. As opposed to last season’s semifinal clash, Barcelona is the team to beat in Paris, followed by Olympiacos as the second big contender. Matching up with CSKA, Barcelona is ahead in all major statistical categories, showing up in Paris with the league’s 2nd to highest offensive rating as well as the best defensive rating.

Roster Depth

CSKA MOSCOW

POS	NAME	M/G	G	NAME	M/G	G	NAME	M/G	G
PG	HOLDEN	30,20	19	PLANINIC	21,81	20
SG	LANGDON	31,45	19	PONKRASHOV	8,25	19
SF	SISKAUSKAS	30,88	19	KURBANOV	6,28	17	KEYRU	4,17	7
PF	KHRYAPA	31,21	20	VORONTSEVICH	13,16	18
C	KAUN	21,43	19	MENSAH-BONSU	8,56	8	SOKOLOV	7,37	16

The thin CSKA rotation will be tested more than ever before next Friday, with Xavi Pascual’s full eleven mal rotation trying to keep the intensity high for 40 minutes or more. Point guard is the deepest position by far on Evgeny Pashutin’s team. But while Zoran Planinic is doing a solid job in camly setting up the offense, JR Holden is having a far from a great season, falling back into old pre-Messina habits of excessive, consciousless chucking of three pointers and long two pointers. Anton Ponkrashov is a third guy to be able to play the point, but he’s backing up the two spot usually.

Starting at the two spot and playing a team-leading 31.45 minutes is Trajan Langdon, an ultra-smart and experienced, shot-making two-guard who is playing the best season of his life, statistically. At the three spot, the same can be said about Ramunas Siskauskas, tenth in the league in PER, scoring 13.2 points per contest on outstanding shooting numbers while dishing out a career-high 2.9 assists per game, being the focal point of the offense even more so than usual. Backing up Siskauskas is the Russian forward Nikita Kurbanov, a rotation player of the surprising Russian national team 2009 in Poland.

Viktor Khryapa is the third guy having a career season, averaging a very rare 10, 6 and 4 as a point forward in a system where he, as the actual power forward, is sometimes running the pick and roll with the team’s center, Sasha Kaun. At the same time Khryapa was crowned “Defensive Player of the Year” recently, which makes me want to question the decision-makers’ sanity. Great offensive performance without doubt, defensively, probably due to much increased minutes and a bigger role on offense, worse than last season. You can even read between the lines in a recent Euroleague.net interview with Sasha Kaun that Khryapa’s offensive performance has been much more influential than his defensive performance this season. Khryapa’s backup Andrey Vorontsevich is one of the more positive figures on the CSKA roster this season, earning minutes with his gritty play, smart decision-making and solid faceup-game.

Meanwhile, the return of the Matjaz Smodis, a Euroleague all-decade performer who missed the first three quarter of the season with an injury, could provide a huge boost for Pashutin’s squad. It really depends on the fitness of the Slovenian. If fit, his lowpost qualities will add a new dimension to CSKA’s game.

At the five, Sasha Kaun has made a huge leap this season, finally getting comfortable with the play here and flourishing in a larger role compared to last season. Kaun, playing efficient basketball off of his teammates, is shooting a ridiculous 72.7 percent from the field this season. None of the other centers – Dmitry Sokolov, Pops Mensah-Bonsu, as well as the already departed Courtney Sims and Ivan Radenovic – were ever able to fulfil the high expectations.

REGAL FC BARCELONA

POS	NAME	M/G	G	NAME	M/G	G	NAME	M/G	G
PG	RUBIO	20,55	20	LAKOVIC	14,61	17	SADA	10,82	19
SG	NAVARRO	24,89	19	GRIMAU	13,83	20
SF	MICKEAL	26,57	19	BASILE	18,04	16	BARTON	4,08	1
PF	LORBEK	24,11	20	MORRIS	20,24	19	TRIAS	6,21	12
C	VAZQUEZ	17,49	20	NDONG	16,57	19

The balanced Regal FC Barcelona roster is equally top level in athleticism and finesse, in inside scoring and outside scoring, in team play versus one on one skills. There are two quality players with similar characteristics on every position, except for small forward, where a Pete Mickeal backup who brings the same physical and scoring skills as the 32-year-old, is missing. Unsurprisingly, Mickeal has the team’s best overall plus/minus rating.

At point guard, Ricky Rubio has proven all doubters wrong in adjusting his game to the highest level, playing second or third fiddle on offense, as opposed to a very free and creative role in Joventut earlier in his career. Victor Sada is bringing similar skills but certainly less creativity, while Jaka Lakovic, arguably the best pull up jumpshooter in the league, adds a new dimension with his scoring at the point. Rubio is without doubt the main point guard over Sada, and how much Lakovic is used depends on how the opponent defends the pick and roll.

Shooting guard Juan Carlos Navarro is the undeniable star of this team, and he’s the only player who’s really allowed to take a bad shot from time to time. They count on his ability to create out of nothing and make difficult shots when it matters most. Savy veteran Roger Grimau is backing up Navarro, usually providing great decision making as a two with ballhandling duties.

At the three spot, the aforementioned Pete Mickeal is one of the most effective scorers in the whole league, and we know that many American players have difficulties playing effective basketball within the team system on elite teams. Coach Xavi Pascual is full of praise:

He is a very important player for each and everyone of us. He has had a very solid season, understanding when he needed to step up and adjusting well to our defensive profile. We are happy with his character, hard work, steadiness and his desire to get better and better every day.

The sharp-shooting Gianluca Basile is backing up Mickeal at the three spot, but he’s really more of a shooting guard and it remains to be seen how he will match up with the taller Siskauskas, Kurbanov, Vorontsevich and maybe even Khryapa, depending on Smodis’ readiness to contribute at the power forward spot.

The incredibly finesse Erazem Lorbek, arguably the best lowpost scorer in the European game right now, is sharing the four spot with the American veteran Terence Morris, whose scoring efficiency is off the charts, leading the league in points per possession. Jordi Trias is unlikely to see playing time if the game remains close, but he’s a quite quality player who is too valuable to sit on the bench for more than a season.

The athletic, shotblocking tandem of Fran Vazquez and Boniface N’Dong is sharing duties at center. Both play off of their teammates, run the floor hard in transition, are highly efficient from in close and can drain the occasional jumpshot.

Two key players With another Lithuanian guy averaging more than seventeen points in Piraeus and pumping his chest after every single play, we easily forget how great Ramunas Siskauskas is silently performing this season. Clearly a season for the ages for the 31-year-old whose scoring efficiency is unheard of while averaging a career-high 2.9 assists per game and leading his team in overall plus/minus. My front-runner for MVP for having taken this CSKA team to Paris.

Juan Carlos Navarro is the guy who puts Barca over the top. Over the top of Real Madrid for example, who he exploded for 24 and 21 points against respectively in Game 3 and 4 of the “El Classico” quarter final series. Matching up with Trajan Langdon, this is the time for Navarro to make us forget last season’s disappointing Final Four appearance.

All eyes on Ricky Rubio. Ricky is clearly in the focus this season, not only as a 5th pick of the Minnesota Timberwolves in the 2009 NBA Draft, but first and foremost as Europe’s up and coming point guard who has arrived in the group of five, six elite playmakers with this extemely promising first season in Barcelona. Rubio is used to perform under pressure, played an Olympic Final and won the EuroCup, but the Euroleague Final Four is a different monster.

Key Matchups

The game may be decided on the wing, where four of the top performers of this Euroleaue season collide: CSKA and Barca plus/minus leaders Ramunas Siskauskas and Pete Mickeal clash at small forward, while Trajan Langdon, just as exactly a year and a day ago in Berlin, faces Juan Carlos Navarro. Back in Berlin, Navarro was whistled for two quick fouls and quickly picked up his third in the second quarter, drawn by Langdon, who Messina had quickly isolated in the lowpost shortly after Navarro’s re-inclusion for solely that purpose. Foul trouble on any of the four guys would hurt painfully their respective teams, as it did hurt Barca back then.

More factors
1. Pace – pace is likely going to be in the 68-69 possessions/team-area. Pashutin might want his players to push it even lower, into the 64-65 area.
2. Experience – Even if Barcelona is the oldest team in Paris, nobody beats this veteran CSKA team in terms of high-level-experience. Siskauskas, Langdon, Holden, Smodis have been there – and won it – multiple times.

---

MAY 7TH, 21:00 CET: OLYMPIACOS vs. PARTIZAN

Overview Second Final Four participation in as many years for Olympiacos, who have already reached goal number three (in relevance) this season by winning the Greek Cup (their first title in nine years) but won’t be satisfied if it remains that way.

The fastest of all 24 Euroleague teams is sniffing a great chance to make it to the Euroleague Final, facing a low-budget club in Partizan Belgrade, who they – individually, player by player – should put in their place, but we know it’s not that easy. Partizan is the classic underdog and has been overperforming for years, despite a low budget, continuous financial worries, and despite having to deal every summer with the departure of the elite talent they themselves developed. Reaching the Final Four is the ultimate success for them, and after having progressed through the tough Top16 group where they faced Barcelona, Panathinaikos and Maroussi before beating Maccabi Tel Aviv in four games in the quarter finals, we cannot say it isn’t deserved.

Roster Depth

OLYMPIACOS PIRAEUS

POS	NAME	M/G	G	NAME	M/G	G	NAME	M/G	G
PG	PAPALOUKAS	23,69	17	PENN	18,10	12	BEVERLEY	9,51	17
SG	TEODOSIC	29,93	20	HALPERIN	14,31	20
SF	CHILDRESS	31,96	18	VASILOPOULOS	13,44	15	PAPANIKOLAOU	6,38	6
PF	KLEIZA	30,04	20	MAVROKEFALIDES	10,80	12
C	BOUROUSIS	16,16	15	VUJCIC	15,43	20	SCHORTSANITIS	12,45	17

Olympiacos is going small with two point guards (enabled by Theodoros Papaloukas’ size and ability to defend wing players), two small forwards and one pure center. Papaloukas is in a pure pass-first role on the one spot. Milos Teodosic is starting to shoulder a lot of responsabilities himself this season, averaging 15.5 points and 6.1 assists per game, and basically, making a lot of plays, whereas Papaloukas is the guy who gets the whole offense going as someone who knows where the ball needs to go every second he is on the court. Scoonie Penn has fought and defended his way to third guard in the rotation, a role that had been reserved for Yotam Halperin before. But Halperin, despite solid offensive numbers, looks to be out of Giannakis’ plans, having been left out of A1 action recently, with Patrick Beverley taking the sixth foreigner spot in the Greek league. Beverley himself is unlikely to play a lot of minutes in the Final Four. If he does, his role is to force McCalebb or whoever he is up against into bad decisions by playing suffocating defense.

At the forward positions, 30+ minutes are assigned to the Josh Childress/Linas Kleiza tandem. Childress, one of the top transition players in the league, is usually on the break before his teammates have collected the defensive rebound, which hurts his own rebound rate a bit, but with the help of Papaloukas’ and Teodosic’s excellent passing skills, guarantees him a fair share of easy baskets out there. Linas Kleiza usually arrives with the second wave and is one of the candidates to make a long distance shot early on the clock. In halfcourt, both enjoy a lot of freedom but have displayed nice offensive awareness and ability to play with the flow of the offense this season, rarely forcing the issue and usually letting the outstanding point guard tandem organise the offense instead. Defensive specialist Panagiotis Vassilopoulos and the fairly skilled Loukas Mavrokefalides serve as backups on three and four respectively.

At the five, Giannakis is trusting a trio of completely different center types: Ioannis Bouroussis is option 1A, a defensive presence with solid shotblocking, a reliable jumpshot and few but effective post moves, an elite center last season but his drop in minutes and a decreasing role on offense has hurt his game a bit. Nikola Vujcic, arguably the best passing big man in the world, can be extremely valuable on offense, and as plus/minus indicates, opponents aren’t really taking advantage of his (alleged) defensive incapabilities. The third guy, Sofoklis “Baby Shaq” Schortsanitis, can be valuable in low-score, halfcourt-dominated games but is not the best option in this fast-paced Olympiacos system. Clearly Bouroussis is, a guy who’s quick up and down the floor. Giannakis is adjusting his minute-management at center to whatever suits the respective opponent best.

PARTIZAN BELGRADE

POS	NAME	M/G	G	NAME	M/G	G	NAME	M/G	G
PG	McCALEBB	29,27	20	RASIC	17,89	20
SG	KECMAN	23,50	20	BOZIC	17,96	18	SINOVEC	2,48	9
SF	VESELY	23,84	20	MILOSEVIC	6,94	20	MITROVIC	2,92	17
PF	ROBERTS	31,46	19	DJEKIC	9,92	20
C	MARIC	24,90	16	VRANES	18,48	20

The Partizan roster is much more structured as far as the basic positions are concerned: Bo McCalebb & Aleksandar Rasic form the point guard tandem getting things going, with Rasic sometimes switching to the two spot to play alongside McCalebb, which has been rather uneccesary recently considering the superb play of Dusan Kecman and captain Petar Bozic’s rock-solid performances. Rasic himself is struggling with extreme inconsistencies, putting even more pressure on the young McCalebb, who’s handled it all fairly well up to this point.

At small forward, the super-talented Jan Vesely, a physical speciman at 2.11m/6’11ft, blessed with outstanding quickness and leaping abilities as well as showing great work ethic and overall attitude, has gone to full-power-mode after a slow start to the season. Vesely can be incredibly valuable with his defense as well as his abilities in transition and his off-ball-movement in halfcourt play. Backing up Vesely are Strahinja Milosevic as well as the young Aleksandar Mitrovic, who I expect to be more of a contributor next season.

At power forward, the energetic, defensive-minded, hard-working and glass-cleaning Lawrence Roberts will try to limit the excentric Linas Kleiza (more on that later), as well as trying to deliver one or two dagger three pointers and a couple of postmoves on offense. Clearly Roberts’ scoring efficiency isn’t where it should be, but he does have his qualities in other areas. Branislav Dekic will join in whenever Roberts leaves the floor, and the 1991-born Dekic’s play has been quite positive recently.

Center is probably where Partizan are most scary. The 2.29m/7’5ft Slavko Vranes had been the laughing stock of European basketball a few years ago, but nobody is laughing about him now, in a season where he altered shot after shot after shot in the lane and was even able to make fans forget Aleksandar Maric after the Serbo-Australian had gone down injured for most of Top16. Maric himself (I had an article on him earlier this season) has been ultra-productive, leading the team in scoring and rebounding while being second in the whole league in PER, and if given the opportunity, he will capitalise for sure. Both guys are extremely hard workers and form arguably the most physical center tandem in the whole league.

Two key Players I’ve been stressing this a lot: Theodoros Papaloukas is still one of Giannakis’ most important players. Olympiacos outscores not even by a point in 40 minutes when he’s off court, but by more than 15 in the same timespan when he’s on court. As pure a pass-first playmaker as you can find, his impact on the court isn’t reflected at all in boxscore statistics. But considering he is averaging more assists than field goal attempts, you might get an idea of his priorities. Foul trouble would be harsh for Olympiacos. Papaloukas turns 33 next Saturday, what a birthday present it would be for him to win the trophy in Paris.

It is even tougher to pick a key player on this equally balanced Partizan roster, but considering all the pressure next weekend, solid decision-making at the point guard position will be key for Partizan. Bo McCalebb is one of the revalations of the season, defending, hustling and slashing Partizan into the Final Four while calmly managing things as the team’s main playmaker. McCalebb may never become an above average passer, but he has quickly learnt how to control the pace, when to attack, when not to attack, when to pass and when not to pass. His exceptional series versus Maccabi was a nice illustration of the progress he’s made throughout this season.

All eyes on Jan Vesely (Small Forward). Vesely had been a projected 2010 lottery pick had he not opted out of the draft a week ago. He’s a central figure in this matchup for two reasons: a) Whenever Partizan beat an elite team this season (three times by my definition of elite teams – versus Barcelona, Olympiacos and at Panathinaikos) Vesely was excellent, averaging 12.3 points, 9.3 rebounds, 2 steals and 5 free throw attempts over the course of this trio of games. b) America, and that’s usually a lot of eyes, will watch with interest this direct matchup with their very own Josh Childress, still the most selling overseas story alongside Ricky Rubio.

Key Matchups

Euroleague’s defensive plus/minus leader Lawrence Roberts is facing Olympiacos’ topscorer- and rebounder Linas Kleiza, a fake power forward who plays really more of a small forward on offense and has a clear advantage in quickness over Roberts. It is not a big risk to predict that Vujosevic is going to install Roberts in the lowpost early on, just as he did versus Maccabi’s Stephane Lasme, who is unlike Kleiza not an offensive thread, rather a fantastic shotblocker, but the purpose – drawing quick fouls on a key player on the opposing team – remains the same.

Vesely versus Childress deserves mention, as well as Ioannis Bouroussis’ efforts to keep Aleksandar Maric off the offensive glass. On the small positions, Bo McCalebb will most likely have the task to limit Milos Teodosic, who had been playing out of his mind in Top16 and the quarter finals. McCalebb’s slashing abilities could pose problems for Teodosic on the other side.

More factors
1. Refereeing – if they let them play, it will favour Partizan, who play very phsical and usually need a lot of fouls. Considering the large audience, I doubt this is going to be the case.
2. Pace – Could be a factor, or could not. Whereas Olympiacos is at its very best when flying out in transition, Partizan is a chameleon, being able to win games either way. Regarding Olympiacos, point guard Bo McCalebb thinks slowing down the pace would help Partizan in limiting Euroleague’s most efficient offense:

The biggest thing in that game was our coach saying, ‘Just try to control the pace’. Maccabi has crazy fans just like us, so when you’re in their gym, you can’t let them make runs. In the beginning of that game, we didn’t do that. We didn’t play defense. We took bad shots. We had to control the pace of the game, and we started late in that game, but we did it. We’re good when we do that. We can run some, like any team, but we’re better when we set the pace. [Playing Olympiacos] is kind of like playing Maccabi in that regard.

Bo McCalebb on Maccabi, pace and Olympiacos

3. Rebounding – A key factor in every game that includes Partizan. Aleks Maric alone had 8 offensive rebounds in the regular season victory over Olympiacos, while Olympiacos as a team had only 19 defensive rebounds. But the reasons lie much deeper, as it must be a priority for Giannakis to have his backcourt prevent McCalebb’s, Rasic’s and Kecman’s penetrations.

Partizan has again proven most of us wrong. Looking at the roster before the start of the season, there was no way this low-budget-team was going to repeat the successes of earlier seasons. Partizan had just lost its core – Novica Velickovic, Milenko Tepic, Uros Tripkovic and Stephane Lasme – and hadn’t exactly made jaw-dropping splashes on the transfer market: Aleksandar Maric had been a backup center in Granada, Lawrence Roberts arrived from rivals Crvena Zvezda, Dusan Kecman had spent a season on the Panathinaikos bench, and Bo McCalebb, who had – like many players before him – posted huge numbers in the Turkish league for Mersin – , replaced no-show Milt Palacio a week before the Euroleague-opener versus Unicaja. Quarter final material? Hardly, we thought.

Partizan’s fans, homecourt advantage and fighting spirit have been deservedly glorified over the last years, but I refuse to believe that a non-talented team can reach the last eight of the Euroleague, especially when it faces such tough competition as Partizan had down the road in all these years. I do believe that Partizan has had high-quality player material in the past few years. Partizan never reached Top16 or the quarter finals just because they were lucky with the draw. They fought and played off everyone that came their way. If they needed a win over CSKA in Moscow to reach Top16, they got the win.

Pionir: Living hell or basketball temple? Depends on which side you play for.

Leaving the special spirit of Partizan aside, what are the measurable factors that have made Partizan a consistent Euroleague quarterfinalist in the last three years? I have been closely tracking team statistics in past seasons, and Partizan has always, in each of the seasons, been a top three club in rebounding in the Euroleague, both offensively and defensively. With the roster changing on a yearly basis, this can hardly be a matter of single players.

SUMMARISING KEY TEAM CHARACTERISTICS

Again, there is a clear, measurable dominance by Partizan on the boards on both ends of the floor this season. Defensively, Aleks Maric and crew are pulling down 75.5 percent of the opponent’s missed shots, as good as 3rd among all 24 Euroleague teams, and 1st among all remaining quarter finalists. On the other end, Partizan players are rebounding 38.0 percent of their own misses, first among all Euroleague participants and miles ahead of the second best offensive rebounding team in the league, Olympiacos at 32.3 percent.

	OFFENSIVE RATING*			70.9 (14th)
	DEFENSIVE RATING*			73.2 (13th)
	OFFENSIVE REBOUNDING PERCENTAGE			0.380 (1st)
	DEFENSIVE REBOUNDING PERCENTAGE			0.755 (3rd)
	PACE**			69.7 (18th)

*Points for(OR)/against(DR) per 70 possessions
**Possessions per 40 minutes

Looking at offensive and defensive efficiency however, Partizan is only 14th in the league in offensive, and 13th in defensive rating. Not necessarily a surprise, if we have a sober look, Partizan concedes more baskets than it scores and has a very average record of eight wins and eight losses this season.

The Serbian team is playing at a moderately slow pace, averaging 69.7 possessions per 40 minutes, 18th fastest team in the league. Playing at “your” pace can be one of the keys to victory, especially for an extremely slow (like CSKA or Partizan) or fast (Prokom, Olympiacos, Maccabi) team playing against an opponent that plays exactly the opposite type of pace. Take a look at the following chart, where the game pace is on the vertical axis, while each Euroleague Gameday is on the horizontal axis. If you hover with your mouse over one of the data points, you’ll see the exact game pace, and the result.

Clearly, Partizan plays very rarely at their average pace of 69.68 possessions per 40 minutes. They had nine games at over 70 possessions per game, six games at under 66.5 possessions, and only one game in between. I find the lower part (below 66.5 possessions per game) of this chart highly intriguing. In six games against Panathinaikos (twice), Maroussi (twice), Barcelona (home) and Unicaja (away) – all of them very difficult opponents – Partizan won four games. Maccabi, third fastest team in the Euroleauge, has gotten some excellent results even at this slow pace, but still it seems that Partizan’s chances would improve if they played at their slow pace, instead of Maccabi’s fast pace.

CLUTCH PARTIZAN
Another factor might be Partizan’s extremely strong nerves and really solid execution in crunch time. Versus Efes, Dusan Kecman sealed the deal for the Serbians 2.8 seconds from time. Against Olympiacos, Maric and Rasic in particular had clutch jumpshots to fight off the guests. Lawrence Roberts had key baskets versus Maroussi and Barcelona. It seems that Vujosevic is finding a new hero once in a while: Partizan has won five of six games that were decided by six points or less. This is a team with extreme confidence, especially at home.

ROSTER DEPTH

POS	NAME	M/G	G	NAME	M/G	G	NAME	M/G	G
PG	McCALEBB	28,48	16	RASIC	19,21	16	MITROVIC	2,39	13
SG	KECMAN	22,95	16	BOZIC	19,45	14	SINOVEC	2,67	8
SF	VESELY	23,63	16	MILOSEVIC	6,92	16
PF	ROBERTS	31,44	15	DEKIC	10,28	16
C	MARIC	26,02	12	VRANES	18,51	16	MILOSEVIC	6,96	3

McCalebb and Roberts log heavy minutes for coach Dusko Vujosevic, as usually does Aleks Maric, whose average minutes decreased a bit when he wasn’t playing at a hundred percent after his return from injury. Jan Vesely is clearly another key player, having been on the floor a little over 30 minutes per game (2nd on the team) in Top16. Rasic, Bozic and Vranes are full-time contributors, logging nearly 20 minutes a game each. Dekic (10.28) and Strahinja Milosevic (6.92) have appeared in every game so far this Euroleague season. This is a solid 9 1/2 man-rotation or whatever you may want to call it, giving players the time to recharge their batteries before they again enter the court and play their hearts out.

STYLE
A lot of high screen and roll action and downscreens to free the shooters. They play a rather slow, halfcourt-dominated style, but Vesely in particular is a huge one-man fastbreak weapon. In setplay, McCalebb, Kecman and Rasic take the ball inside at all costs, either dishing it off to a teammate or driving it all the way to the hoop, regardless of traffic in the lane. This way, even if they miss the initial shot, they often catch the defense on a wrong foot and free Maric, Vranes and Roberts for offensive putbacks. The penetration game is a key part of Partizan’s success. McCalebb is one of the best slashers in the league. Against Maccabi, Partizan must manage to play smart to not run into the hands of one of the best shotblockers in the league, Stephane Lasme. Partizan has been doing that very well so far: Despite putting an emphasis on driving the ball to the basket, they only get blocked 2.88 times a game. Penetrating to the baskets also gets you to the free throw line: At 0.460, Partizan is league-leader in free throw attempts per field goal attempt, right in front of Olympiacos.

Aleks Maric’s boxscore statistics may lead some to the misbelief that Partizan is looking for Maric in the lowpost excessively. They do that from time to time, but most of his baskets really come off pick and roll dishes, or from offensive putbacks. At the moment, 62.5 percent of his made field goals are created by an assist. Add to that the points he scores off offensive rebounds, and you have a very low number of long lowpost action where he backs down his man and creates the basket for himself. Anyway, the way he positions the big man (very deep) has always been a charcteristic strength of Vujosevic’s offense. And he certainly has had the centers over the last few years that can create and maintain position.

ALEKS MARIC – ASSISTED FIELD GOALS

	2FGM/G		%AS		3FGM/G		%AS		FGM/G		%AS
	5,3		0,625		0,0		0,000		5,3		0,625

On the downside, Partizan are league-leaders in turnovers per game. They better not turn the ball over at a too high rate in the quarter finals, since Maccabi players have very good hands and are extremely strong in the open court.

However, Maccabi’s matchup zone may pose a completely new obstacle to Vujosevic this season, one that may completely change their offensive style. While attacking the zone clearly isn’t only about three point shooting, Partizan’s subpar 32.2 percent shooting from beyond the arc certainly doesn’t help them.

INDIVIDUAL SEASONS

Petar Bozic: Traditional statistics (5.4 PPG, 35.3 2FG%, 32.1 3FG%) don’t explain Bozic’s important role on this team: As a pesky defender and huge energy boost off the bench. According to plus/minus, he has a positive impact on both ends of the floor, especially on defense. Read more later in this post.

Branislav Dekic: The still only 18-year-old Dekic was a nice surprise early in the season, when he unexpectedly showed up in Partizan’s rotation. He clearly cannot maintain the same level of play when subbing in for Lawrence Roberts – surely not on defense – , but he gives his teammate valuable breathing time while already learning about the game at such a young age.

Dusan Kecman: Veteran, allround play, sometimes off the bench, sometimes right from the start. Very strong rebounding for a swingman.

Aleksandar Maric: Maric is having a spectacular 09/10 campaign, averaging 14.9 points and 9.6 rebounds. He’s one of the league leaders in rebound rate on both ends of the floor, and plus/minus suggests that he’s a key player for this team – particularly on offense, where Partizan averages 11.52 points more per 70 possessions when he is on the court, compared to off the court. You might also want to take a look at oncourt/offcourt field goal percentages for Partizan (second to last row in the table below): When Maric is on the court, Partizan as a team shoots 48.5 percent from the field. When he’s on the bench, they make only a subpar 39.5 percent of their attempts.

However, Partizan still managed to grind out huge wins over Panathinaikos and Barcelona without Maric (Vranes was exceptional in both games) in Euroleague Top16. Mainly however through suffocating defense, not through efficient offense.

FLOOR TIME STATS

ON COURT

OFF COURT

DIFF

MINUTES

312,23

332,77

.

POINTS FOR

595

539

POINTS AGAINST

570

609

DIFF

25

-70

.

POINTS FOR PER 70 POSSESSIONS

76,81

65,29

11,52

POINTS AGAINST PER 70 POSSESSIONS

73,58

73,77

-0,18

DIFF

11,71

.

FG %

0,485

0,395

0,089

.

OPP FG %

0,446

0,431

0,016

Bo McCalebb: McCalebb, playing his first European season at a serious level, is surprisingly mature at the point, really picking his spots and timing penetrations. He’s one the key facilitators on Vujosevic’s roster, and he creates a large part of his shots for himself. Just take a look at the following chart, which shows the percentage of McCalebbs successful field goals that were created by an assist: 17.6 percent overall, only 9.2 percent on his two-pointers.

ASSISTED FIELD GOALS

	2FGM/G		%AS		3FGM/G		%AS		FGM/G		%AS
	4,1		0,092		0,6		0,778		4,6		0,176

Strahinja Milosevic: Milosevic is providing single-digit minutes as a more interior-minded small forward, when Vesely is taking a breather. Appeared in all 16 games so far this season, but only three times stayed on the floor 10+ minutes.

Aleksandar Mitrovic: Mitrovic is doing very short jobs on the floor, often right before halftime. Still showed up in 13 Euroleague games.

Aleksandar Rasic: Somewhat inconsistent (look at his points game by game below), but boy he had some huge moments this Euroleague season. Particularly in the home game versus Olympiacos, when he had several clutch baskets, as well as against Rytas. According to plus/minus, he does motor the offense, despite his woeful shooting percentage. Was 4/28 from three point range in Top16.

Rasic’s scoring production: Somewhat inconsistent

Lawrence Roberts: A hundred percent emotion and enthusiasm. Very valuable on defense (with him oncourt, Partizan only concedes 69.15 points per 70 possessions) and rebounding. Seems to have a thing for hitting clutch shots. I saw him play several times before looking at his boxscore statistics, and I was quite surprised: He’s only shooting 36.3 percent for two, and 29.4 percent for three.

FLOOR TIME STATS

ON COURT

OFF COURT

DIFF

MINUTES

471,58

173,42

.

POINTS FOR

820

314

POINTS AGAINST

809

370

DIFF

11

-56

.

POINTS FOR PER 70 POSSESSIONS

70,09

72,98

-2,90

POINTS AGAINST PER 70 POSSESSIONS

69,15

86,00

-16,85

DIFF

13,96

.

FG %

0,442

0,433

0,008

.

OPP FG %

0,428

0,466

-0,038

Jan Vesely: After an unspectacular regular season, Vesely lifted his play to new levels in Top16, rebounding, hustling, fastbreaking and posting his way to 9.5 points and 6.8 rebounds. Suddenly showed signs of a lowpost game. Brings a huge energy level. Plus/minus-statistics mark him as a highly valuable defender. Let’s hope he stays in Europe for a bit. It certainly doesn’t look good (projected 11th pick overall by Draftexpress) at this point.

Slavko Vranes: From Gameday 8 onwards, Vranes was outstanding. Definitely stole the spotlight with his defense in the Top16 games versus Panathinaikos and Barcelona. Camps in the lane like noone else, never shows up outside for the pick and roll. Totally different player than Maric. Still, statistically, their defensive efficiency is on a pretty similar level.

PLUS/MINUS-STATISTICS
For a more comprehensive introduction to plus/minus, read one of my earlier posts or browse through the several Euroleague previews I’ve written in the past weeks. All we do is basically take a look at how a team performs (in terms of scoring and conceding points per 70 possessions – an average for a 40-minute Euroleague game) on offense and on defense when a certain player is on the court compared to off the court.

Partizan has a nicely clear plus/minus structure on the power forward and center position. On power forward, almost every time Lawrence Roberts checks out, Branislav Dekic checks in. Hence, Roberts’ offensive margin (-2.89) is almost exactly the opposite of Dekic’s offensive margin (3.24), while Roberts’ defensive margin (-16.85) is very close to the opposite of Dekic’s (16.24). The relation of Maric’s to Vranes’ numbers is on a similar level. On the guard positions, there is a much bigger and more versatile rotation, hence things are more complicated there.

MINUTES

POINTS FOR/70POS

POINTS AGAINST/70POS

NAME		ON		OFF		ON		OFF		DIFF		ON		OFF		DIFF		DIFF
Petar Bozic		272,33		372,67		72,08		69,98		2,10		71,05		75,6		-4,55		6,65
Branislav Dekic		164,47		480,53		73,28		70,04		3,24		85,78		69,54		16,24		-13,00
Dusan Kecman		367,13		277,87		68,29		74,27		-5,98		74,44		72,68		1,76		-7,74
Aleksandar Maric		312,23		332,77		76,81		65,29		11,52		73,58		73,77		-0,19		11,71
Bo McCalebb		455,62		189,38		69,80		73,43		-3,63		72,90		75,56		-2,66		-0,97
Strahinja Milosevic		110,77		534,23		66,59		71,75		-5,16		81,51		72,06		9,45		-14,61
Aleksandar Mitrovic		31,03		613,97		57,15		71,56		-14,41		100,01		72,35		27,66		-42,07
Zarko Rakocevic		13,82		631,18		52,51		71,27		-18,76		78,77		73,57		5,20		-23,96
Aleksandar Rasic		307,32		337,68		75,81		66,37		9,44		75,16		72,34		2,82		6,62
Lawrence Roberts		471,58		173,42		70,09		72,98		-2,89		69,15		86,00		-16,85		13,96
Stefan Sinovec		21,33		623,67		85,03		70,38		14,65		79,36		73,49		5,87		8,78
Jan Vesely		378,03		266,97		71,87		69,45		2,42		70,37		78,36		-7,99		10,41
Slavko Vranes		296,18		348,82		65,60		75,34		-9,74		73,76		73,61		0,15		-9,89
Stevan Milosevic		20,88		624,12		63,70		71,11		-7,41		69,49		73,82		-4,33		-3,08

Let us draw some careful conclusions: 1. As already mentioned, Dekic isn’t really able to keep pace with Roberts’ intense defense. When Dekic is on the floor, Partizan concedes 85.78 points per 70 possessions. When Roberts in on the floor, Partizan concedes 69.15 points per 70 possessions. That’s a significant difference in defensive quality but not really surprising, considering the guy is only 18 years of age. On the other hand, the offense doesn’t suffer at all.

2. Maric and Vranes: On defense, according to the numbers, not much of a difference, on offense, a huge difference in Maric’s favour.

3. With his -7.99 on defense, Vesely is a huge defensive factor, 2nd most important on the team. With him oncourt, Partizan only concedes 70.37 points per 70 possessions.

4. Despite his shooting woes, Rasic has an offensive plus of 9.44.

5. If we take the isolated numbers, the most efficient offensive lineup is: Rasic (9.44), Bozic (2.10), Vesely (2.42), Dekic (3.24) and Maric (11.52), while the most efficient defensive lineup is: McCalebb (-2.66), Bozic (-4.55), Vesely (-7.99), Roberts (-16.85), Maric (-0.19).

Of course, plus/minus at such a small sample size needs to be handled with care. I am presenting these numbers in order to provide you an additional, new view at individual performance, but as much as scoring 15 points at a solid shooting percentage doesn’t necessarily mean you played a great game, plus/minus has noise too. It’s just a bit different. It certainly isn’t an end of all tool to evaluate a player’s value for his team.

SUMMARY
A team that tries to take the ball to the basket and either score directly or free the big men by doing so. Great team on the boards, for several years now. Roberts and Vesely anchor the defense. Slow pace seems to suit them, whereas quarter final opponent Maccabi usually plays at a faster pace. Strong belief in themselves in crunch time, especially on home court. Statistically, only midlevel efficiency in both ends of the floor as a team, low-level for a quarter finalist.

Subject of my fifth in-depth analysis of Euroleague quarter finalists is Isreaeli basketball powerhouse Maccabi Tel Aviv, who recently qualified via an emphatic 97:82-home victory over Montepaschi Siena and Real Madrid’s parallel victory in Istanbul over Efes Pilsen.

Maccabi hadn’t exactly been a favourite for quarter final participation after a less-than-encouraging three losses in four games at the end of the regular season. Head coach Pini Gershon decided to let go of big man Maciej Lampe (who is now lighting up the EuroCup in the white and green dress of Unics Kazan) and eventually went on a shopping tour for a big man but came away empty handed, since all rumoured candidates – namely Miroslav Raduljica, Dimitris Mavroeidis and Vladimir Golubovic – were still under contract and Maccabi arguably either didn’t want to pay a buyout (probably a sensitive topic behind club walls anyway, Maccabi usually doesn’t buy players out of running contracts) or some of the players simply weren’t trusted by Gershon & management to be good fits on the roster.

Few did it matter: Maccabi hoisted the State Cup, 77:70 in the final over Bnei Hasharon, and won three of five in what is arguably the most competitive of all Top16 groups, at the expense of Italian champion Montepaschi Siena, who are still on a high quality level but seemingly lacking the energy and drive that had made them one of the toughest teams on the continent in recent years.

Now, everyone will be looking to Palacio Vistalegre next Thursday, where Real Madrid and Maccabi will be battling out first place in a rematch of the 07/08 clash, when a clutch three pointer by Yotam Halperin forced overtime and gave Maccabi the chance to proceed and kick Real out of the tournament. Felipe Reyes, Sergio Llull and Louis Bullock, the three remaining players from that Real Madrid roster, will hardly have forgotten. Needless to say, finish first and you’re in great position to advance to Paris, facing either Partizan or Maroussi (I simply don’t see a Partizan win in Barcelona in such an important game happen) with home court advantage. Finish second, and you are up against the team that has been playing the best basketball throughout the season, Regal FC Barcelona.

Back to the Final Four? Pini Gershon and Maccabi Tel Aviv have shown improved play in Top16

SUMMARISING KEY TEAM CHARACTERISTICS
Starting off my analysis of this year’s Maccabi Tel Aviv is a look at five key team statistics. Maccabi is only playing the 11th most efficient offense in the league, scoring 73.6 points per 70 team possessions. First in this ranking is Olympiacos, quickly followed by Barcelona. Defensively, Maccabi is one of the elite teams of the Euroleague, conceding only 69.2 points per 70 possessions, as good as second in the league-wide ranking, behind FC Barcelona. In rebounding, Maccabi is really an average to subpar team on both ends of the floor. Pulling down 27.4 percent of their own misses on the offensive end (17th) and 70.5 percent of the opponent’s misses on the defensive end (11th). Maccabi is certainly paying a bit of a price on the boards for playing with two pure jumpshooters on power forward in David Bluthenthal and Guy Pnini, and their defensive rebounding percentage is surely a bit down due to Gershon’s frequent use of the zone defense.

	OFFENSIVE RATING*			73.6 (11th)
	DEFENSIVE RATING*			69.2 (2nd)
	OFFENSIVE REBOUNDING PERCENTAGE			0.274 (17th)
	DEFENSIVE REBOUNDING PERCENTAGE			0.705 (11th)
	PACE**			73.5 (4th)

*Points for(OR)/against(DR) per 70 possessions
**Possessions per 40 minutes

In game pace, Maccabi is fourth in the league at 73.5 possessions per 40 minutes, behind Asseco Prokom, Olympiacos and Unicaja. In case you read Friday’s Real Madrid Preview, you’ll have come across Real’s inconsistency in controlling the pace of a game this season. This really doesn’t apply for Maccabi. Looking at the following chart – Pace on the y-axis, each Euroleague Gameday on the x-axis – 10 of 15 games were played at a pace of about (the recent game #15 vs. Montepaschi is slightly above) 70-75 possessions per game.

We also see that Maccabi still won four of the five games that are not in the 70-75 possessions-area, still, it appears noteworthy to me that Maccabi is having much less extreme pluses and minuses on the chart than Real and other clubs.

ROSTER DEPTH
With the departure of Lampe, Guy Pnini has taken over the job as almost full-time power forward (he is seeing only limited minutes at the small forward spot now) behind David Bluthenthal. Alan Anderson and Chuck Eidson have been logging huge minutes all throughout the season so far, while Andrew Wisniewski’s minutes have decreased significantly if we compare Euroleague regular season (31:45 minutes) with Top16 (20:24). Meanwhile, Doron Perkins now averages 24:37 in Top16, over 17:25 in the regular season.

POS	NAME	M/G	G	NAME	M/G	G	NAME	M/G	G
PG	WISNIEWSKI	27,98	15	PERKINS	19,83	15
SG	ANDERSON	28,23	15	LIMONAD	5,64	11	SHARP	1,54	8
SF	EIDSON	32,07	15
PF	BLUTHENTHAL	22,49	14	PNINI	16,03	15
C	LASME	19,25	15	FISCHER	19,01	15	GREEN	5,32	11

Fischer and Lasme are sharing minutes at center, with Green joining in from time to time for strictly defensive purposes. Raviv Limonad has meanwhile been averaging single-digit minutes on both guard positions. Derrick Sharp is joining in as a clutch free throw shooting option, even if he has yet to attempt one, when Maccabi is ahead and the opponent looks to play stop-the-clock.

Gershon is basically utilising a balanced eight-man-rotation. This is a rather short bench for a Euroleague-quarter finalist, and it is quite surprising to see that Maccabi is still managing to be one of the elite defensive teams in the league, despite lacking two, three additional players that can enable a high defensive intensity over 40 minutes. However, comparing substitution patterns, the rotation is not as short as Evgeny Pashutin’s six-and-a-half-man-rotation in Moscow.

The following chart displays Gershon’s minute-management in the recent Euroleague game versus Montepaschi. Horizontally, there are 40 fields for every player: those are the minutes, 1 to 40. Easy to see that Lasme, Fischer and Green were playing at center exclusively (none of the three spent minutes at power forward), while Pnini and Bluthenthal spent five minutes oncourt together, meaning that one of the two was playing at small forward during that span. Wisniewski, Anderson, Eidson and Perkins are rotating minutes at the one to three positions, with only Wisniewski being really limited to one position (point guard).

Talking about adjusting the look of the starting five and adjusting playing time management so that it fits to the opponent the team is matching up with, Gershon is arguably the most flexible coach in the Euroleague. For example, he can be starting Yaniv Green against very good big men (like Tiago Splitter this season), trying to draw a defensive foul here and an offensive foul there. He’s also open to risky small ball lineups without any inside players, usually going with a zone on defense.

STYLE
A really versatile team whose key characteristic is the availability of several great ballhandlers on the floor that are able to run the pick and roll and create scoring opportunities for themselves and teammates. With Maccabi being the fourth fastest team in the league and trying to produce scoring opportunities early on the clock, this is really a key aspect in their game, since they don’t need to wait for their point guard to bring the ball upcourt and make a play, but instead, everyone who is bringing the ball upcourt is able to create off the pick and roll or read well other situations. Watching Maccabi games, you will see a lot of immedeate side pick and rolls run by Eidson, Perkins, Anderson or Wisniewski early on the clock. Talking about making plays, a lot of the point guard-responsabilities are being taken off of Andrew Wisniewski’s shoulders by the help of the ballhandling shooting guards and point forward Eidson. Clearly, being a point guard in Tel Aviv differs from being a point guard in, for example, Piraeus.

With the offense running through the guards, the power forwards and centers primarily have screening and finishing tasks on offense, Pnini and Bluthenthal as jumpshooters (both attempt more three pointers than two pointers), Lasme and Fischer inside and midrange. Statistically, we see their offensive roles partially explained by field goals that were created by an assist:

ASSISTED FIELD GOALS

			2FGM/G		%AS		3FGM/G		%AS		FGM/G		%AS
	Guy Pnini		0,7		0,636		0,9		0,786		1,7		0,720
	Stephane Lasme		1,9		0,607		0,0		0,000		1,9		0,607
	D’Or Fischer		2,9		0,659		0,0		0,000		2,9		0,659
	David Bluthenthal		1,4		0,500		1,7		0,583		3,1		0,545

Pnini in particular is marked by the stats as a catch-and-shoot player, with 78.6 percent of his successful three pointers being created by an assist.

As far as further offensive characteristics go, Gershon likes to post up Anderson and Perkins on physically weaker guards, trying to cause foul trouble via matchup advantages inside. It has been successful at times, but in i.e. the very subpar performance in Athens versus Maroussi, the production resulting from the matchup advantages by Anderson and Perkins in the post didn’t really justify sacrificing all the offensive rythm, destroyed by the use of too much isolated, slow post play.

Taking a look at from where shots are coming, this year’s Maccabi is going well in line with Gershon’s earlier rosters, not relying on the three too much – 34.8 percent of all attempts are fired from the outside, 21st in the league – but instead putting an emphasis on making things happen by going to the basket, nicely illustrated by a free throw attempt-field goal attempt ratio of 42 percent, which is as good as fourth in the league behind Partizan, Olympiacos and Panathinaikos.

Defensively, Gershon likes to throw in zones, but judging by the games I’ve seen this season, man-to-man defense is a priority. Maccabi has a lot of long arms in the lane, with Stephane Lame, last year’s leading Euroleague shotblocker, working as a defensive anchor in the paint. As defensive plus/minus numbers (later in this post) are illustrating, he is making quite a difference on this end of the floor.

INDIVIDUAL SEASONS

Alan Anderson: Criticised for his “one on five”-mentality earlier in the season, Anderson has silenced the critics simply by posting huge numbers that have made him Euroleague February MVP. In Top16, he is averaging 20 points, 5.4 rebounds and 2.6 assists in 35:27 minutes per game. Anderson is having the ball in his hands a fair amount of times in the game, being 7th in the Euroleague in individual possessions per game at 14.0. At the same time, he’s one of those guys really creating their own shot, having only 30.1 percent of his made field goals created by an assist. The whole team, minus Anderson’s field goals, has a percentage of 66.4 percent. However, as far as plus/minus-statistics go, the Maccabi offense is producing at a similar level when Anderson is on the bench, as you’ll read later in this post.

ASSISTED FIELD GOALS

	2FGM/G		%AS		3FGM/G		%AS		FGM/G		%AS
	3,7		0,291		1,2		0,333		4,9		0,301

David Bluthenthal: Bluthenthal is an incredibly valuable member on this team due to his ability to make the jumpshot. He is +13.72 offensively in adjusted plus/minus, and Gershon apparently isn’t risking too much with Bluthenthal oncourt this season defensively, considering they are only conceding 70.19 points per possession when Bluthenthal is on the floor. Without him, they concede a moderately but not significantly better 68.51 P/70POS.

Chuck Eidson: Not a leader … is what (some?) Maccabi fans are accusing him of. Clearly, fulfilling all the expectations that he generated via his EuroCup-MVP winning 08/09 season for Rytas was never a realistic task. If we take a sober look, Eidson is having a fairly productive season offensively, serving as one of two key players for Pini Gershon. Defensively, things are different: opponents are shooting 42.1 percent from the floor (last row in the table below) when Eidson is on court as opposed to 36.0 percent when he’s on the bench.

FLOOR TIME STATS

ON COURT

OFF COURT

DIFF

MINUTES

481,07

123,93

.

POINTS FOR

938

234

POINTS AGAINST

893

203

DIFF

45

31

.

POINTS FOR PER 70 POSSESSIONS

74,68

72,32

2,36

POINTS AGAINST PER 70 POSSESSIONS

71,10

62,74

8,36

DIFF

-6,00

.

FG %

0,466

0,441

0,025

.

OPP FG %

0,421

0,360

0,061

D’Or Fischer: Fischer’s numbers were expected to come back down to earth on a much more balanced roster than last season’s. Back then, some might have forgotten already, he was one of the league leaders in Euroleague efficiency ranking.

Yaniv Green: A defensive role player for Gershon who can be on the court in one, and off the court the next second.

Stephane Lasme: Huge defensive presence that goes far beyond the blocks per game-category, if we trust adjusted plus/minus at an admittedly small sample size: The team is conceding only 61.28 points per 70 possession when he’s on the floor, but 76.79 when he is off.

Raviv Limonad: Role player for single-digit minutes on both guard positions. He’s enjoying a much larger role with the strict native players-rule in the BSL.

Doron Perkins: Perkins had been one of the BSL’s best players last season and successfully completed the jump to a Euroleague Final Four candidate. He’s having a successful attack on Wisniewski’s minutes recently, bolstered by positive plus/minus-numbers.

Guy Pnini: A bit of a surprise for me. I saw an enthusiastic and talented, but also pretty provocative and sometimes immature player at Hapoel, but he’s really a nice spark off the bench for Maccabi as his game is still full of energy, but seems to have matured over the last couple of years.

Derrick Sharp: Veteran and Maccabi legend Sharp is quite a statistical anomaly in the running Top16: He’s played 1:03 minutes so far … in four games.

Andrew Wisniewski: After a nice start, Wisniewski has been struggling lately. I usually don’t pay much attention to boxscore-summary stats (normal efficiency formula, PER, etc.) but comparing his Euroleague-ranking data from recent games with earlier games, there is a significant drop-off in production. Basically, it already decreased as the Euroleague regular season progressed, but was extremely low in Top16, before he had 10 points on 5 for 10 shooting, 2 assists and 4 steals against Montepaschi last week.

Chart: Andrew Wisniewski’s single-game Euroleague-ranking (RKG) has been rather de- than increasing over the course of the season.

PLUS/MINUS-STATISTICS
For a more comprehensive introduction to adjusted plus/minus, I am again pointing you to an earlier post of mine or to earlier posts in this in-depth-analysis series. Basically, we are examining how many points a team scores (columns 3 to 5, excluding the player name column) and concedes (columns 4 to 7) per 70 possessions (equals about 40 minutes in an average Euroleague game) when the respective playea is on (“ON”) and off (“OFF”) the court. We then look at the difference on both offense and defense, and the end result, combining defense and offense (column 8). As mentioned, all numbers are on a 70-possession-basis. We could as well say “per one possession”, but per 70 possessions gives you an idea about the actuol impact in points one player had if the player was on the court a whole game – in Maccabi’s case, a little less than a whole game, since they average 73.5 possessions per game – , and if fatigue wasn’t a factor.

For example, when Alan Anderson is on the floor, his team averages 74.25 points per 70POS, compared to 74.07 when he’s off. Makes a very moderate difference of +0.18. Defensively, when he is oncourt the team concedes 67.83 points in average, whereas they concede 73.02 points when he’s off. This makes it -5.19. A minus in the defensive “DIFF”-column means that actually the defense is doing better when he is on the court. Combine offense and defense, and we have an overall adjusted plus/minus of 5.37.

MINUTES

POINTS FOR/70POS

POINTS AGAINST/70POS

NAME		ON		OFF		ON		OFF		DIFF		ON		OFF		DIFF		DIFF
Alan Anderson		423,5		181,5		74,25		74,07		0,18		67,83		73,02		-5,19		5,37
David Bluthenthal		314,9		290,2		80,78		67,06		13,72		70,19		68,51		1,68		12,04
Chuck Eidson		481,1		123,9		74,68		72,32		2,36		71,10		62,74		8,36		-6,00
D’Or Fischer		285,2		319,8		68,63		79,17		-10,54		68,09		70,54		-2,45		-8,09
Yaniv Green		58,5		546,5		81,84		73,38		8,46		80,53		68,19		12,34		-3,88
Maciej Lampe		138,0		467,0		74,94		73,98		0,96		70,22		69,14		1,08		-0,12
Stephane Lasme		288,8		316,3		68,71		79,21		-10,50		61,28		76,79		-15,51		5,01
Raviv Limonad		62,1		542,9		96,89		71,60		25,29		99,97		65,89		34,08		-8,79
Gal Mekel		1,0		604,0		77,90		74,19		3,71		00,00		69,50		-69,50		73,21
Doron Perkins		297,4		307,6		76,89		71,59		5,30		69,03		69,73		-0,70		6,00
Guy Pnini		240,4		364,6		79,49		70,71		8,78		78,22		63,56		14,66		-5,88
Derrick Sharp		12,3		592,7		108,99		73,48		35,51		108,99		68,56		40,43		-4,92
Andrew Wisniewski		419,6		185,4		71,47		80,38		-8,91		68,91		70,46		-1,55		-7,36

If we exclude the cases of small sample size (Green’s 58.5, Limonad’s 62.1 and Sharp’s 12.3 minutes are not enough to be able to draw conclusions), there are some interesting numbers in this table: Best offensive difference is Bluthenthal’s 13.72, followed by Pnini’s 8.78 and Perkins’ 5.30. In fact, Bluthenthal’s and Pnini’s excellent offensive numbers go inline with the plus/minus-stats of other three-point-shooting power forwards that stretch the floor. Many of those have very good plus/minus-numbers, probably due to this ability to stretch the floor with their shooting and thus create space for big men and guards to do their work via postgame, penetrations, pick and roll. Sometimes those faceup-forwards give up quite a bit on defense due to physical inferiority against more inside-minded power forwards, as is the case for Pnini (an extremely bad 14.66 on defense), but not for Bluthenthal (a moderate 1.68). By the way, the reason why both have extremely positive offensive numbers – which seems unlogical since, when Bluthenthal is off the court, Pnini usually replaces him on the court, so there should be a certain balance – is pobably the fact that Pnini played a lot at small forward in the regular season, and Lasme, Fischer and Lampe played quite a bit at the power forward position. If we would indeed compare Pnini’s and Bluthenthal’s Top16 (not all-season-)numbers, there should be a certain balance.

On the negative on offense, Lasme’s – 10.50 stands out as much as much as Fischer’s -10.54 and Wisniewski’s -8.91. Defensively, positive are Lasme’s outstanding -15.51 and Anderson’s -5.19. Weak defensive numbers: Pnini (14.66) and Eidson (8.36). According to the isolated numbers (I have no data of how certain lineups in fact work together, planning to start this next season), Wisniewski (-1.55), Perkins (-0.70), Anderson (-5.19), Bluthenthal (+1.68) and Lasme (-15.51) would probably form a quite decent defensive lineup.

Always take the plus/minus-numbers with a grain of salt. They are, in my opinion, valuable as comparison data to go along with your observations when watching a game, but not as a single source for individual player quality. After I had been confronted with the numbers, I took, for example, a closer look at Eidson’s defense and felt the numbers were quite accurate in stating that Eidson does a very subpar defensive job. It certainly makes you look at specific things, and defense in particular is still an underrated part of the game among us fans, so it is interesting to have an actual number as an orientation for own in-game oberservations.

In many cases (Diamantidis excellent defense, Spanoulis ultra-weak defense this season, Splitter importance on both ends, Papaloukas huge impact on offense with his passing, Vesely excellent defense, etc.), the numbers have been quite in line with the general perception of players, but not in all of them.

SUMMARY
A balanced eight-man-rotation with Anderson and Eidson as the key ballhandlers. Second best defensive side in the league, fourth fastest pace, average numbers on offense and on the boards. Alan Anderson has been on fire in Top16, Wisniewski hasn’t. Lasme is a key presence in the middle, Bluthenthal a key shooter on offense. This season might live and die with Thursday’s clash in Vistalegre. Win in Madrid, and Maccabi has a fantastic chance of making it to Paris. Lose, and the chances drop to a minimum. Talking about Paris, a fast-paced and defensively intense Maccabi squad is probably a quite uncomfortable opponent to match up with, even if other clubs are favoured to win the big thing.