BallinEurope, the European Basketball news site

So call BallinEurope kooky: While everyone else with an eye on basketball – even European basketball, for Arvydas Sabonis’ sake – is concentrating on the NBA free-agent market, BiE is all attention on the 2010 FIBA World Championship for Men tipping off in Turkey in August.

Naturally, bookmakers too are into it and the early odds for the FIBA World Championship are up, including props on outright winner, group winners and even game one matches available at BallinEurope.com sponsor SportingBet.

Unfortunately, the SportingBet “2010 FIBA World Championship for Men Outright Winner” prop bet is merely that; no “each way” betting allowing punters to bet on the second-place finisher: a key wager in this tourney, should you be one of the teeming majority reckoning Team USA is the prospective runaway champion of this thing. The odds table looks like the following.

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The Eurocup tournament concludes this weekend with the quartet of matches comprising the competition’s final four. Backed by a handful of road-tripping fans, Alba Berlin will take on the Black Tide of Bilbao Bizkaia Basket in the late game. Starting things up tonight will be Victor Claver and his youthful Valencia Power Electronics (That’s the team name, right? The Valencia Power Electronics?) teammates against Eurocup Coach of Year Ilias Zouros and more-than-the-sum-of-parts Panellinios.

So onto the stories (and one videoclip)!

Alba Berlin: Fans twittering 24-hour bus ride
Talk about turning the proverbial lemons into lemonade; the folks at Alba Berlin basketball went into damage-control mode yesterday upon realizing that some 400 ticket-holders might be stranded in Deutschland rather than be able to attend the final four games in Vitoria.

So what happened? Not only did the front office manage to provide a swell bus for the most rabid of backers, not only will sponsors Caja Laboral provide free food for the group upon arrival, not only will Jordi Bertomeu be personally meeting with the German road warriors, but these devotees are so into the road trip as to be tweeting the experience. (Last update: about 2.15am CET.)

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Can Childress and Big Reds Machine sweep?

This one’s exactly what it says: A grab bag of clippings and clips regarding the eight teams squaring off in tonight’s Euroleague semifinals games. Enjoy the factoids, enjoy the games!

• If it’s March, tradition tends to demand that CSKA Moscow basketball augment its collection of trophies; 2010 is proving no exception. This month saw Viktor Khryapa capping (thus far) a career year with a Euroleague Player of the Month nod; two weeks ago, Khryapa was named Russia Cup MVP as Moscow took home the hardware in the final over Unics Kazan, though it has been said that “As expected, the slam-dunk contest held at the CSKA arena before the Russian Cup final completely overshadowed the [championship match] itself.”

What’s that? Dunk contest? Awesome! Though Spartak St. Petersburg’s James White (formerly of Fenerbahce Ulker and the San Antonio Spurs) took home the prize for achieving Jordan-like flight, CSKA’s Pops Mensah-Bonsu – surely the baddest dunker in all of Euroleague – was robbed early on; you’ll know it when you see all the 9s that should have been 10s. (And by the way, what’s up with Igor Tkachenko of Unics Kazan sporting that funky CCCP gear?)

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With things going 75% as planned in the Euroleague playoff games one (just don’t tell the surely still shaken Maccabi crowd, victims of the surprising quarter), the wisdom of the sportsbook reckons most game two matchups to be more of the same – well, except maybe Baskonia won’t be *so* blown out in Moscow.

Three of four pointspreads on tonight’s games, as provided by Euroleague/Ball in Europe sponsor Sporting Bet, are set at minus-8 or -9 to the homers and only Olympiacos is predicted for a double-digit win; that game also figures to be the barn-burner of the lot, with a 165.5 over/under. All lines and odds run below the break.

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Nice of the Euroleague to stack up nearly every game in the last round of the Top 16 on one night, eh? Sheesh, this is worse (or better, depending on viewpoint) than the weekend following the All-Star Game in the NBA. Of the seven games on the slate, six will still help shape the final eight field; the sole “pride game” tonight will be the Montepaschi Siena-Efes Pilsen match in Italy. Officially-derived possibilities for the final eight may be found at the Euroleague website.

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After last week’s slate of Euroleague upsets, is anyone else searching for the upset bid tonight? Three games tip off and, if the oddsmakers make up for their definitive lack of correctitude in Euroleague Top 16 Week 2 play, all three home teams are looking to double-figure wins.

The closest game on the schedule, according to Ball in Europe sponsor Bet 365, will feature Asseco Prokom trying to make up 10 points in Moscow against the heating-up CSKA side. While pundits were inspecting the likes of Orleans and Asvel Basket to act as Euroleague Cinderella for 2009-10, most were sleeping on Asseco and Maroussi, two teams suddenly looking great for surprise tournament bids. Figure upstart Asseco covers that 10 and that The Euroleague Fantasy Boss makes the correct decision on Qyntel Woods again.

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After a night of upsets in Euroleague play last night, can any would-be punter feel safe betting on any of tonight’s games? To wit, which of tonight’s three matches looks rife for an upset finish and/or acknowledgement of seriousness, i.e. the BC Khimki demolition of Unicaja (are we witnessing the rise of a new Russian power)?

The marquee matchup is clearly Maccabi Tel Aviv-Real Madrid, with the Sporting Bet pointspread set at a puny minus-1 for the homers – essentially a “pick ‘em” line. And as unbeatable as Partizan is once again proving to be in their home confines with the win over Barcelona, Maccabi is currently at 9-1 in Tel Aviv in 2009-10.

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Five games are on the Euroleague slate tonight; five outcomes are left to fate and more than one interesting storyline already unfolds in 2010.

The feature matchup this evening, as far as oddmakers at Ball in Europe sponsor Bet 365 are concerned at least, would be Montepaschi at Istanbul. Efes Pilsen is one of three home underdogs tonight and, with the way this team appears to be rife with internal dissension, this line is no surprise. The Efes Pilsen meltdown is surely on the horizon and one is only surprised this handicap isn’t greater: Go MPS minus the points.

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With one upset in the books from last night – and nice work it was, too, with Partizan shutting down PAO like that – one wonders if Euroleague Final 16, week one has any other surprises awaiting. (After all, Euroleague’s 2009-10 edition has been reasonably predictable thus far.)

Among the lines offered at Euroleague/Ball in Europe sponsor Sporting Bet this week are some true who’da-thunk-it lines: Seriously, at the beginning of the season would you have reckoned Cibona would be plus-10.5 at Khimki or that Zalgiris would be a four-point underdog in going up against Asseco Prokom? In fact, that Zalgiris plus-4 is kinda tempting, as is that line of Olympiacos plus-3.5 at Baskonia.

Meanwhile, pity poor Maroussi BC, the team the sportsbook figures to be the latest corpse laid out by Barcelona, with a 83-63 drubbing predicted for the Greek team.

Pointspreads and over/under lines for tonight’s Euroleague games, as provided by Sporting Bet, follow the break.

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Now that the Euroleague field has been thinned, Ball in Europe takes a brief look back at how well esteemed the favorites of fall 2009 are looking now.

Similarly to the NBA situation going into 2009-10, the Euroleague field in October appeared to be a group of haves and have-nots with but a half-dozen favorites – Panathinaikos, FC Barcelona, Olympiacos, Real Madrid, CSKA Moscow and Montepaschi Siena – representing the former. This hasn’t changed, but after an eventful first round, the positioning at sportsbooks has shifted considerably.

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