One good half is not enough to win in the Euroleague
Olympiakos failed to follow up its spectacular Euroleague win over Fenerbahce with victory at Villeurbanne, while Panathinaikos suffered its second reverse in Spain within three days. Both games highlighted that one good half is not enough at this level.
The Reds wasted their excellent first half and their supremacy in rebounds to go down 77-75 to ASVEL in France on Thursday.
Losing a game on the road after leading it by 20 points (42-22) will have made Olympiakos coach Giorgos Bartzokas wonder what went wrong with the team that just two nights earlier had beaten the hitherto Euroleague leader.
However it was above all the major improvement in Villeurbanne’s game that changed the fate of the game, with the hosts shining in defense (nine steals against none) for a partial 46-28 score in the second half.
The Reds therefore suffered their fifth loss in 14 matches, despite having Sasha Vezenkov score 16 points and Isaiah Canaan add another 14.
Panathinaikos gave its host Barcelona a decent scare on Friday before going down 74-68.
The Greens once again found themselves chasing after a particularly poor first quarter when they trailed 28-12, but then started to reduce that deficit to win all three remaining quarters and get to within one point from Barcelona (69-68) with three minutes remaining.
However they failed to score since and allowed Barcelona to win by a modest six points in the end.
Paced by Dwayne Bacon (19 points) and Giorgos Papagiannis (13 points), Panathinaikos is now on a 6-8 record.
