A difficult win against a combative Aris

In the 1st day of the Basket League Top 6, Olympiacos bested Aris at the Peace and Friendship stadium 85-77.

The 'red & whites' were sluggish in the beginning of the game. Missed free throws (1/6), lost rebounds (5-11) and gaps in the defense, allowed the Thessaloniki team to set the tempo and close the first quarter at +5 (15-19). The zone defense Aris was playing continued causing significant problems for our team's offense, giving the guests the chance to open fire from the three-point line and increase their lead to +7 (28-35). Bartzokas' players had an imminent reaction. They leaned heavily on their defense and with Nigel Williams-Goss and Moses Wright taking leading roles, they ran a partial 11-3 streak and closed the first half leading the score. 

The game remained a derby throughout the 3rd quarter, that found Olympiacos with a small lead (57-56). Aris, that continued shooting quite well from the long range, got ahead 57-60. However, the 'red & whites' - despite never reaching high performance standards - put a lot of pressure in the back court, found score from the three-point line, built a 7-point lead (71-64) at 35' and kept control of the game to the end.   

• Kostas Papanikolaou and Filip Petrusev were out due to injuries, together with Luke Sikma and Ignas Brazdeikis who are not eligible to play for the Basket League.

The quarters: 15-19, ,39-38, 57-56, 85-77.