A comfortable victory at the premiere
Our team began victorious the official games for the Basket League SKRATS edging Apollon Patron 82-56.
The 'reds' beat Apollon and are now focusing on the Euroleague premiere in Valencia on Thursday.
The beginning of the game found Milan Tomic' team to lead with continuous scoring by Dunston and Spanoulis. The 'reds' completed the first quarter leading 19-15.
The Piraeus team improved their performance, stole balls, found scoring in the transition and hence the first half was completed with Olympiacos leading 41-29.
Olympiacos tightened defense even more in the third quarter. Agravanis, Lafayette and Dunston continued scoring and the difference was up to +20 for the first time at 28' (57-37). The end of the third quarter found the team heading 65-39.
The Piraeus team maintained the difference above 20 points, Mouratos debuted with the Olympiacos shirt and scored his first points, Christodoulou got minutes and Olympiacos reached a 82-56 victory.
The quarters: 19-15, 41-29, 65-39, 82-56
Olympiacos (Tomic): Petway 4 (1 3p, 5reb), Hunter 11 (7reb), Dunston 13, Spanoulis 17 (3 3p.,5reb, 8as), Sloukas 9 (9reb,8as), Lafayette 9 (3), Mouratos 2, Christodoulou 7 (1), Agravanis 4, Mantzaris 6 (1 3p, 5reb, 3as), Katsivelis.
Apollonas (Vetoulas): Skordilis 4, Αrgyropoulos 6, Galloway 4, Pen 22, Fitzpatrick 5, Antonakis 1, Batis 7 (1), El-Amin 5 (1), Gorgonis 2.
MILAN TOMIC: "We remained focused for all 40 minutes and kept building the difference quarter by quarter. We are staying at that and the spirit of the players who reacted only a few days following a lost game. For us, Agravanis is a plus, he played quite well. We do need him in the game against Valencia and I think he will be helping us a lot."
As for the future, the coach said that the team needs: "…victories and a lot of work on the floor. We don't need to talk off the court, only on it. That's how a crisis can be overcome. It's only sure that victories and playing good basketball is going to cut it".
For everything that happened following the game against Panathinaikos: "Olympiacos never ends. So, we all need to support Olympiacos so that he moves forward. We have to stay together when we win and when we lose. I think that the more we try to explain what is this that happens against Panathinaikos is worse. Olympiacos is now going to be facing Valencia, we have a lot of games ahead of us and we shouldn't be spending time analyzing how and what. Maybe some other time will be more suitable".
Andreas Christodoulou also said: "It was a tough game because we were coming from a defeat. We need to look ahead. Everything that happened belongs in the past. We are now only interested in the game against Valencia for the Euroleague".