About the Olympiakos - CSKA game I have some comments to do. Feel free to ask questions or correct me if I'm wrong ( or even ignore my post <!-- s
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After the end of the first period I was 100% sure, that Olympiakos will beat CSKA for one more time. There were many reasons I think, for such thoughts. Olympiakos ( sorry for my tone ) crushed CSKA in the first period, Bourousis, Woods and Blackney were simply great, and we were playing great defense on CSKA's guards and forwards. But all of sudden, CSKA managed to overtake Oly's margin of 12 points, in only 2(!!!!) mins.
There are two explanations for this matter. The first one of course is that Oly is a team with a very little experience in "do or die" situations, and cannot manage easily the margin on +12 points. The second explanations is, CSKA Moscow is a HUGE team, in every aspect of the game. In defense, in attack, in pick n' roll, in pick n' pop ( especially with players like Smodis and Andersen, able to score from the 3points line, when they will have the opportunity to ) etc. So, their PSYCHOLOGY, was "in the 7th heaven" and Oly's players' one was in bottom of the earth.
Yiannakis did 2 great mistakes today. The first one was, that he started the "god damned" ( <!-- s:p -->[img]{SMILIES_PATH}/tongue.gif[/img]<!-- s:p --> ) 2nd period ( when Oly was in front, with a +12 margin ) with Vasiliades, Macijauskas, Blackney, Tsakalides and Printezis in the starting five! WTF man ? 5 rezerves ? Anyway... The second HUGE mistake, is that he wasn't able to stop CSKA's "impetus" in the 3rd period, where the game substantially finished ( I don't know, if you remember the moment where G-R-E-A-T ( tonight ) Siskauskas scored a three pointer. At the same time, Tsakalides pushed Smodis ( I think ) and CSKA had the ball once again, and Siska scored another three pointer ( 6 points in one attack and the score was 45-60, +15 for CSKA ).
CSKA's win, was FAIR and "SQUARE". The refs were pretty bad for both sides ( I think they were the main reason, Vassilopoulos did such a bad game tonight, 2 fouls that didn't exist, in the first 5 mins of the game. At least that what I saw from the stadium ), and I hope we will get more help from some key players next time, like Greer, Bouroussis and someday from Macas. The key for CSKA today, was their three pointer percentage, and key players were Papaloukas and Siskauskas.
PS. I have some pics and some videos from the game, but sorry guys, I'm not really in mood to upload them tonight. Maybe tomorrow... <!-- s
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PS2. There were max, 13.000 fans in SEF tonight!