Fought in Istanbul, but it wasn't enough
Olympiacos lost 75-65 to Anadolu Efes, has now a 12-11 record and now the Turkish team (15-8) are the favorites for the fourth position and home court advantage in the play-offs.
Olympiacos was especially off target in the first three minutes of the game. However, apart from bad shooting, the 'reds' succumbed to many easy offensive turnovers and the Turks were leading 8-2 and 18-9 a little later on. Nikola Milutinov and Briante Webber were the only ones to score, but when Strelnieks, Vezenkov and LeDay entered the equation, the situation was turned. Olympiacos continued playing superb defense and with Papanikolaou contributing all over the floor, Olympiacos ran a partial 17-0 to make the score 18-26 at 12'.
In the second quarter, however, too many turnovers and bad shooting all over again, cost David Blatt's team and hence Anadolu found the way to return to the game and even lead by half time (36-35). The first five minutes of the second half was a night mare for Olympiacos. With a partial 10-2, Ataman's team was leading 47-37 at 25'. Strelnieks took over at that point and the 'reds' closed in 51-49 in only three minutes with the Latvian guard seeming unstoppable.
From that point on, the hosts run a partial 9-0, taking the difference to +11 (60-49) for the first time in the game at 31'. Printezis was 'awakened' and together with the very solid defensive game the Piraeus team was playing, Olympiacos closed in 62-59 at 35'. Hence, the six consecutive points by "Print" assisted to make the 2-10 partial run. Efes reacted and run a partial 6-0 of its own, practically 'locking' the victory at 37', when the score was 68-59.
The quarters: 18-22, 36-35, 56-49, 75-65.
Αnadolu Efes (Αtaman): Larkin 11, Beaubois, Motum 5 (1), Moerman 12 (2), Pleiss 8, Micic 10, Anderson 5 (1), Dunston 11, Simon 13 (2).
Οlympiacos (Blatt): Weber 8 (1), Williams-Goss 7, Toupane 2, Τimma, Μilutinov 12 (8reb), Strelnieks 14 (3 3p, 5reb, 2as), Vezenkov 4 (4reb), Printezis 7 (6reb), Papanikolaou 7 (1 3p), LeDay 4.
"Bad percentages cost us"
The coach of Olympiacos, who did not attend the Press Conference due to a lower back problem, spoke about the game against Efes. "We did a great job defense wise, but we couldn't score. And you need that to win a good team on the road. If you don't score, you can't win. We made a lot of mistakes that we could have avoided, in every game we make between 10 and 20 turnovers, you can have ten turnovers, because the opponent plays as well and puts pressure, but we also made wrong choices, we played without focus. We need to react and win a few games. We are in a very difficult time in terms of our schedule".
Then, David Blatt said that we "played against Fener on the road, Maccabi on the road, against Barcelona that's in great shape right now, at home, we played against Efes on the road, it's clearly a very tough period. We need to be realists, they were game we could have won, but also lose. We lost to Maccabi at the last shot, we had a few chances to win here, but we never led and from some part on, we made a lot of mistakes, we were shooting bad and we delaying with making decisions. We are now very upset, we need to calm down. Now the schedule may be a little better, so we need to look ahead and move on".
KESTUTIS KEMZURA: "If we were told that we would be receiving 75 points from Efes here, we would have won. But we made 15 turnovers and many details cost us. We made many wrong passes and allowed them easy scoring. We took our shots, but missed them; we were shooting bad and lost the game. We had problems scoring. On the other hand, when you are at this level, you know that the opponent is going to be punishing each and any mistake. And that's what happened".
During the last four losses of the 'reds', Olympiacos has been averaging 65 points and the Lithuanian associate of David Blatt replied that "we are looking to find the solution. These ensembles that will be giving us a larger score and solutions with our offense. We were good defense wise and we could have been better, the difference was made by small details and the lack of focus. There are no excuses, we did not do what we should have and lost. We should have found solutions and be more aggressive on both ends of the floor. There are times we take steps forward and others that we make steps backwards in terms of our performance, we need to find the way to play just like we can and want".
AXEL TOUPANE: "When we closed in at three points, we made a lot of turnovers. We did not lack the energy; we allowed them easy baskets due to back to back turnovers. We now need to focus ahead. When we start winning again, all we'll be better and we will start playing better. We haven't been good offensively lately, we have bad percentages, we make a lot of mistakes, this hurts us psychologically and because we think too much, we can't score".