A battle fought but lost …
Despite many and important absences in its roster, Olympiacos looked CSKA in the eye, however (although coming back from a 25 point deficit) did not succeed in securing the big win.
The ‘reds’ lost 74-75, in a game for the 26th round of the Euroleague, with Kostas Koufos, Kostas Papanikolaou and Hassan Martin at the pits.
Olympiacos played an excellent defensive game in the first quarter (only received 6p.), however zero scoring! Sasha Vezenkov scored the first points for the ‘reds’ at 5’ (a three), but the team still could not get into playing rhythm. On the contrary, CSKA moved the ball, struck both from the perimeter and from inside the paint and with a partial 18-6 sent the difference skyrocketing to 15p. (9-24 at 9’). Giorgos Bartzokas ‘shuffled’ the deck, but our team’s outlook did not change. On the opposite side, the Russians took advantage of the turnovers, the bad choices the ‘reds’ were making, as well as their lack of alertness in the offense and the difference went to +18 (26-44, at 20’).
In the second half, the guests only increased the margin (+25, 26-51), but it was at that point when the ‘reds’ began showing some sings of life… Shaquielle McKissic gave the signal for the counter attack, while the baton was passed later to Vezenkov, Sloukas and Printezis, who closed in to 8p. (49-57 at 29’).
Unforced turnovers by the ‘reds’ gave CSKA the chance to run the fast-break and once again widen the distance (49-63). However, despite Octavius Elis (the only center available to Giorgos Barztokas) was benched with four fouls, Olympiacos found his way to a come back. With Shaquielle McKissic as the absolute protagonist, the team had a one point game after running a partial 15-2 (64-65 at 36’) and turned the game into a derby!
With a three by Vezenkov, the ‘reds’ went ahead for the first time at 37’ (69-68), and they seemed to have the upper hand at winning, when with 12.5’’ on the clock, Giorgos Printezis scored with a lay-up and made the score 74-73 (winning a foul in the same play, but missing the free throw). With 2.6’’ to the buzzer, Spanoulis made a foul on James while he was attempting a three point shot and the American guard scored 2 out of his 3 free throws, making the score 74-75, which was the final one, since after putting the ball back, Giorgos Printezis took the shot but the ball refused to go in …
The quarters: 12-24, 26-44, 49-59, 74-57.
"We should keep our head high"
The coach of Olympiacos, Giorgos Bartzokas, pointed out: “I would like to congratulate CSKA for the win. It was obvious that we had two totally different faces in the first and the second half. If we tried to pinpoint the reasons for this, I would say that there are a lot of things happening with our team these past weeks. A losing streak and Martin’s injury, following that one of Papanikolaou and the also Harrison’s. It seems that we were impacted by all that has transpired lately. However, we showed fighting spirit in the second half, we came back despite losing big at the time. We had the opportunity to win the game, regardless of many things going against us in the last minutes of the game, so as to lose it. We missed free throws, we missed a jump-ball, it was the foul on James and of course, the shot by Printezis. Everything was against us, but we I would like to hold on to the huge effort we made in the second half. I would like to congratulate my players, regardless of the loss. They need to keep their head high and fight every game, till the end of the season. When you are with Olympiacos, you have to win every game. When we don’t win, it’s a problem. On the other hand, that’s how Euroleague is, you play finals from the beginning of the season and the mental approach is that if a team is struck by injuries or a negative streak or anything else, then it’s really tough. The thing is the shape you are in, but also the shape your opponent is when you meet. What I have to say, is that the league is really difficult. We have lost our most hustle players, Papanikolaou and Martin. These two, together with McKissic, are the ones that play with the greatest intensity and when you lack intensity, you have an issue. But everyone who played in the second half were in the right direction, they played with intensity, they played as a team, they stole balls and despite missing many opportunities to finish the game, I would say that our effort in the second half has been remarkable”.
The coach of CSKA, Dimitris Itoudis, commented: “I would like to congratulate my players for a road win. We showed two different faces in the game, or more correctly, two different approaches, both in regard to our game as well as Olympiacos’. We dominated the first half. We dominated with our good defense, deflections, we controlled the rebounds, we had 13 assists and only three turnovers and we did not allow Olympiacos scoring on the open court, since they a team depending a lot on primary and secondary fast-breaks. We began about the same into the third quarter, we got a +23, however, Olympiacos took center stage with its defense. They used a big body, mainly Vezenkov on our facilitator. It’s something we had prepared for at practice, we had worked on it. They stopped our facilitation and forced us to make turnovers and got to run open floor situations. That’s about how they returned to the game. It was a tough game, that might have a different outcome, since Olympiacos deserved to win after such a come back. I’m happy for the victory, because we have to also take into account that it’s a new beginning for us. James had been inactive for about 20 days, Shengelia for 21, Clyburn for almost two months, two new players have come in who have only had five practices with the team and even those not with everyone together, so I’m not trying to find excuses, but the team seemed kind of disconnected in the second half. That takes a lot of work and effort to know what brings the difficult situations on and how we need to mentally manage them. But we made some big shots, we made some good defensive plays and we succeeded in getting this very important victory. We will work though and get better. We need to be better and we are going to be better”.