A defeat in the premiere of the Euroleague
Olympiacos lost to Zalgiris Kaunas 67-68 at the SEF, in the Euroleague premiere.
With eight points in a row by Aaron Harrison, Olympiacos was leading 8-2, however, the Lithuanians very quickly attacked back. Relying on pressing defense that led the ‘reds’ to 6 turnovers in the first quarter – as well as to bad perimeter percentages – the guests got in the driver’s seat (21-15 at 9’). The hosts moved the ball better afterwards, found solutions mainly from the front line with Hassan Martin and Giorgos Printezis and closed the first half at +3 (37-34). The excellent direction of Kostas Sloukas, together with good long range shooting, allowed Olympiacos to set the tempo in the second half and get an 11 point lead (52-41 at 27’), which the ‘reds’ maintained up until the end of the third quarter (58-47). The bad choices the ‘reds’ made when attacking and their extremely ‘poor’ offensive production in the fourth quarter, allowed Zalgiris to get back in the game and close in to one point (67-66 at 39’). Bartzokas’ players continued not being able to find target, resulting in Jokubaitis writing the final 67-68 from the free throws line with 3.5” on the clock.
The quarters: 18-23, 37-34, 58-47, 67-68.
Οlympiacos (Bartzokas): Harrison 8, Charalampopoulos, Spanoulis 9(2 3p., 5 as.), Sloukas 6 (1 3p., 7 as.), Μartin 12, Vezenkov 8(1), Printezis 4, Papanikolaou 3, Jean-Charles 2, Jenkins 5(1), Ellis 4, ΜcKissic 7.
Ζαλγκίρις (Schiller): Walkup 6(2), Lekavicius 6, Hayes 2, Jankunas, Μilaknis 6 (2), Geben 2, Rubit 4, Jokubaitis 12 (1), Vasturia 2, Grigonis 15 (1), Lauvergne 13.
THE COACHES’ QUOTES
The coach of Olympiacos’, Giorgos Bartzokas, pointed out: “It was obviously a painful loss in the first game of the season. Our performance was very poor, especially in the 4th quarter. We shot 3/18 in this quarter and we also had 0/6 open threes. We allowed them too many second opportuniites through offensive rebounding and building their self-confidence. On our level, when you are up by 11, you need to finish the game simply by being smart, but tonight we were not being smart. We rushed to win the game and be done with it. We made bad choices and did not hand the ball correctly. We had to facilitate for shooters more, even if they were missing. It’s only the beginning of the season and we need to learn from this loss and find out what the situation is with the two players we lost during the game, Livio Jean-Charles in the first half and Hassan Martin, who hurt his finger”.
On whether he things that his players underestimated Zalgiris in the fourth quarter and were arrogant, he said: “Relaxing in a Euroleague game shows arrogance. If we are that, we deserve what happens to us. I believe it was the opposite. I believe we were very stressed and this was obvious from the beginning of the game. We play with much more speed at practice and in friendly games. We were indecisive in many things. We knew how Zalgiris was going to play and we analyzed that tactically preparing the game, but still, we lacked a lot of speed. To me, this was not an arrogant team, but rather a team that was under a lot of pressure to play the first game and win it”.
Asked whether the empty gym played a role, he said: “I think 100% yes, but we shouldn’t be using this as an excuse, because that’s how it’s going to be. Not in all games of course, because in some places there are going to be fans, but for us, this is going to be our reality. We played without fans in the friendly games and we need to prepare to do the things we need to do for the team to win. We did a lot of things tonight, so that the team wouldn’t win. I’m talking about some choices that were kind of selfish, defensive choices when we wouldn’t go for the challenged ball. We did not engage the rebounding battle. I know it doesn’t have to do with our players not being fighters, what I know though is that they were under pressure and could not lift themselves from the ground up. But this is also my responsibility, because I have to prepare the team so that we don’t face these situations”.
About the last offense, he commented: “Even that one was wrong. We didn’t even get to shoot the ball… 3.5 seconds are ample time to execute an offensive play. But if we take a look to what came beforehand, we have generally played wrong and especially in the last 6 or 7 minutes”.
that the pick n’ roll executions were better than in our last game and the other one is that we were trailing by eleven points and kept our cool and character and continued to fight. This is very important for us. The other two things I would like to point out is that in the 4th quarter we kept the score very low, which is what we wanted. And I would also like to mention Jakubaitis’ performance, who I believe was the key player for our victory”.