Reigning World Champions Spain will play in their second Eurobasket final in a row after defeating Greece 82-64. These two teams also met in the semi-final in Spain two years ago and the outcome was similar.
Jonas Kazlauskas, head coach of Greece, noted that his players were tired after a quarter-final game against Turkey which needed an overtime to decide the winner. While Spain played their quarter-final game on Thursday giving them one day of rest.
The first quarter was pretty close as the score was tied at 16 with 2 minutes left to play. But Spain managed to use the final two minutes more productively earning a 26-21 lead.
Greek players had problems stopping their opponents in the second quarter as the World Champions secured a 9-point led at the half time. The gap continued to grow in the second half as Spain not only managed to find the ways to the Greek basket but also limited Greek players on their own half court.
Greece needed a run in the fourth quarter to catch their opponents as they were down by 13. It proved to be a too difficult task and Spain increased their lead to 20 points and the first finalist of Eurobasket 2009 was pretty much clear.
Vassilis Spanoulis who was the top player for Greece until the semi-final had just 7 points and turned the ball over 6 times. The young guard Nick Calathes who substituted Spanoulis in the second half finished as the second top scorer for his team with 10 points.
Turnovers was a big problem for Greece as they made a total of 20 turnovers. Half of them were made by two players – Vassilis Spanoulis and Efstratios Pereproglou.
NBA champion Pau Gasol led Spain with 18 points and 6 rebounds. Rudy Fernandez added 14 points. Although Spain reached the final relatively easy they still have not the best history having lost all 6 Eurobasket finals. They will face Serbia, one of two teams that managed to defeat Spain in this year's Eurobasket.
82 – Spain – (26+23+15+18): *Pau Gasol 18, *Rudy Fernandez 14, Sergio Llull 9, Alex Mumbru 9, *Juan Carlos Navarro 8, Carlos Cabezas 8, Marc Gasol 6, *Ricky Rubio 5, Felipe Reyes 3, *Jorge Garbajosa 2.
64 – Greece – (21+19+11+13): *Ioannis Bourousis 11, Nick Calathes 10, *Antonis Fotsis 8, *Vassilis Spanoulis 7, Giorgos Printezis 7, *Nikos Zisis 6, Sofoklis Schortsanitis 5, Andreas Glyniadakis 4, Kosta Koufos 4, *Efstratios Perperoglou 2.
