Not even a proper practice...
A quarter had been enough for the “reds”. Olympiacos, with Teodosic and Spanoulis ‘hiding’ the ball, did not quite have a good practice session in the Maroussi home court and succeeded his most easy victory ever in the said gym (70-94).
In the presence of his fiancé, Maya Ognjanevic, for the first time, Teodosic created magic in the first quarter of the game and Olympiacos seemed to come from outer space opposite a weak, no matter what, Maroussi, that becomes even weaker playing without Gagaloudes, Kojadinovic and one foreigner.
The end of the first quarter found Olympiacos leading by 25 (13-38) with the players of Dusan Ivkovic having 17/18 2-pointers and 94% success! The lead increased to 30 (13-43) at the beginning of the second quarter and at point the “reds” stepped on the brakes and ‘Duda’ began rotating. Even though, the lead stayed at a high level and the 28 points lead at the end of the first half (28-56) made everyone start looking for the widest away League victories of Olympiacos.
However, the beginning of the second half was not the same mainly due to Nestoras Kommatos, who scored consecutive 3-pointers and decreased the margin to 21 and 24 points (54-78) at the end of 3rd the quarter. That actually means that Olympiacos was edged in the said quarter and this was not to the liking of Dusan Ivkovic, who nevertheless kept Spanoulis and Teodosic in the bench (the latter was hurt in the face half into the third quarter, left for the locker rooms but returned shortly after).
Maroussi continued making three point shots in the last quarter as well, not allowing the “reds” to take the lead over 30 points and with Dusan Ivkovic using only substitutions and mainly players with less minutes.
For the record, the two widest away victories in the Olympiacos history are…
ΟLYMPIACOS – APOLLON PATRAS 101-50 51 1973-74
ΟLYMPIACOS - PIRAIKOS 111-69 42 1992-93
Four hundred Olympiacos fans attended the game in the Maroussi gym, as well as the owners of the team, Panagiotes and Giorgos Angelopoulos.
Τhe quarters: 13-38, 28-56, 54-78, 70-94
Μaroussi (Αlexandris): Bojic 7, Νoeas 3(1), Akepsimadis 11(1), Huertas 7(1), Charitopoulos 7(1), Vavatsikos, Winden 11(3), Siamandouras, Κommatos 17(4), Tsontsos, Seferides 5(1), Αgravanis.
Οlympiacos (Ivkovic): Νesterovic 19, Gordon 7(1), Spanoulis 4, Bourousis 3, Keselj 13(2), Μavrokefalides 4, Glyniadakis, Νielsen 9, Papanikolaou 11, Erceg 4, Teodosic 17(3), Κatsivelis 3(1).
DUSAN IVKOVIC:
We tried to keep a good rhythm in the game and we wanted to have the control. The players scored 38 points in the first quarter and then they loosened up. Maroussi got better, despite its losses.
This game will not help us for sure, because it’s a totally different thing playing in Europe. Thirty assists and 10 turnovers cannot be done in Europe. The team has energy and we are missing two important players, Pelekanos and Papaloukas.
The time of the game is very good. They are not fools in the NBA to hold games that way. The games are for the fans. The worst time is at 5p.m. The fans want to watch European football. Playing games at 5p.m. is against basketball, I don’t know if anyone has thought of it.
Papaloukas will start running on Monday and will see from there on, but it’s tough since he hasn’t played in two weeks. I hope we have him with us.
Pelekanos has a muscular problem and we’ll see what happens.
The game lasts for 40 minutes and I think the first quarter did not help us. The team has improved. We need to be a team when it counts, that is at the play-offs. We have a great margin to get better. Both as a team and individually. I hadn’t wanted to lose the second half by 4.
KOSTAS PAPANIKOLAOU: We wanted to be serious from the beginning; it was an important game for us. We wanted to do what we needed to do and get a wide lead as early as possible. We did not want to let the opponent hope.
We don’t care who the opponent is, we prepare the same and we remain focused. We are going after the best possible result, no matter if the opponent is Maroussi or Real Madrid.
We had prepared well and we had been ready to cope with both the time and the game.
VANGELIS ALEXANDRIS: The hour is good for basketball, so long as the fans come to the gym. We should find a way for our games not to coincide with those of football. Football gets tremendous exposure and this hurts our sport even more.
If we take out the first quarter, when we entered the game really scared, then we became better. We try to teach the guys a lot of things. Maroussi has good academies and I have been watching their work. There are kids who can play and help.
In the first couple of games the athletes had been loosened up and had a normal performance. From the moment training got in the way with a proper trainer things have changed. I’m perfectly satisfied by my team for three quarters of the game.
LEFTERIS AKEPSIMADIS: We had been playing one of the best teams in Europe. We wanted to show a good face. We entered the game scared. We were missing important players. If we leave out the first quarter, we fought as much as we could in the next three and we were competitive.