Ball in Europe, the European Basketball Blog

Not as big as Partizan

Anyone who has seen (or much better yet, witnessed live) a game at Pionir Arena in Belgrade knows that, all things considered, the Serbia basketball hall is among the world’s very top spots to see a game. So on March 30th, the Partizan faithful will be arriving at Pionir in droves to witness their Black-and-Whites welcoming … 50 Cent?

Serving as confirmation that basketball is indeed bigger than hip hop in Serbia’s capital, Partizan representatives have announced that rapper 50 Cent’s show scheduled for the evening has now been switched to the basketball venue; Partizan will host Maccabi Tel Aviv in their game three quarterfinal match at the bigger Belgrade Arena.

Partizan added to its record-breaking attendance record of last season by setting a new mark for Euroleague attendance at Belgrade Arena in the 2009-10 quarterfinals when 22,567 came to witness the Serbian side take on Panathinaikos on the road to the latter’s eventual championship:

Continue Reading…

Christophe, the former brain behind BallinEurope now devoted to European Prospects, yesterday reported that France would be the first to adopt the “Homegrown Player” status for its national league.

The LNB steering committee reportedly unanimously adopted the amendment to current player statuses in a Monday meeting and the changes will go into effect for the 2010-11 season. The “homegrown” or “locally trained” player is defined as “he/she who has held a French basketball license for four years between the ages of 12 and 21. The LNB also instituted a grandfather clause for those first licensed in 2009-10.

For 2010-11, between five and seven homegrown players will be allowed to be listed on Pro A rosters, depending on roster size; in Pro B clubs, seven to nine homegrown players will be allowed.

Continue Reading…

Lalić to the rescue!

Ball in Europe doesn’t know if the smoke is clearing for beleaguered Union Olimpija, but at least yesterday’s announcement of the Jure Lalić signing provides some seed for optimism. The 24-year-old Croatian had been playing for EuroCup team Spirou Charleroi.

Much more than a single youth player, proverbial tremendous upside or no, will be required to pull this plunging club out of the tailspin, though. Off the court, the distractions are plentiful, with European and American players quitting the team while alleging non-payment by the club. Essentially, all of Olimpija’s remaining name players – Sašo Ožbolt, Vlado Ilievski, Edin Bavčić, Gašper Vidmar and Nemanja Aleksandrov – charged exactly the same thing last week, holding a player strike. When finally coerced back into action, these five were among seven players who saw action in Sunday’s 85-59 thumping of Cibona Zagreb.

(Now if that ain’t a message to management, BiE doesn’t know what is. What was it that M.J. said? “I didn’t see organizations playing with the flu in Utah“?)

Continue Reading…

It’s official: 18-year-old American phenom Jeremy Tyler has washed out with Israeli club Maccabi Haifa but will stay in Europe next season to further his career and heighten his currently well-low standing on 2011 NBA Draft boards.

Tyler, as you may recall (funny how the early hype machine mysteriously went really silent for a long time there), was the prospective senior-year high school student in San Diego forewent his final year of schooling to pay professional ball in Europe. With some assistance from Sonny Vaccaro, he who helped orchestrate Brandon Jennings’ stint with Lottomatica Roma, Tyler managed to score a one-year, $140,000 deal from BSL team Maccabi Haifa.

Continue Reading…

They’re breaking out the superlatives today over at the ACB’s official website, full in the afterglow of a weekend’s worth of mostly tight games or, as writer Malo de Molina put it, “¡Qué jornada!”

When the dust settled, Real Madrid (20-5) had beaten fourth-place Valencia (16-9) and wrested second place from slipping Caja Laboral Baskonia (20-5), who suffered a shocking 74-58 loss to no. 6 Asefa Estudiantes (13-12).

Cajasol (ranked 5th, 15-10) and giant-killers Gran Canaria 2014 (8th, 12-13) continued their upward trend with wins over Valladolid (10th, 11-14) and Suzuki Manresa (11th, 11-14), respectively. Xacobeo Blu:sens (17th, 8-17) and DKV Joventut (9th, 12-13) managed to snap losing streaks, the latter scoring its first win under coach Pepu Hernandez.

Continue Reading…

With the NCAA basketball tournament field of 65 now set, Lithuania-based Basket News is taking pride today in a trio of countrymen participating in the tourney. Representing the yellow, green and red in March Madness will be:

• Deividas Dulkys, Florida State University. The sophomore formerly of Findlay College Prep managed 8.5 points and 2.4 boards per game while shooting with 39.4% success beyond the arc coming off the bench.

Continue Reading…

Look out, upcoming Olympiacos opponents: Big Sofo is just starting to heat up. After a marginal season in Euroleague play up in the early going (BiE is blaming it on that H1N1 the big man contracted in the autumn), Sofoklis Schortsanitis turned in his peak Euroleague performance of 2009-10 a week and a half ago, going for 19 points in just 18 minutes of playing time (read: “time spent dominating the paint”) against helpless Baskonia.

This weekend, the Red chased up his humdrum 2-of-6 showing in the BC Khimki game by taking the ESAKE All-Star Game MVP award with statistics insane even for such an exhibition: Would you believe 42 points of 19-of-21 shooting, including 3-of-5 on threes and a perfect 16-of-16 from within the arc?

Continue Reading…

It’s not that BallinEurope is obsessed with both Bill Simmons and Rubio-to-Minnesota, but … all right, i am obsessed with both Bill Simmons and Rubio-to-Minnesota. Still, when BiE finally got around to reading this week’s patented “Mailbag” column only to see no. 1 best-selling author The Sports Guy take an incorrect swipe at the poster boy for European basketball’s future on the international stage, well, BiE had to come to the defense of Rubio, especially since the sparring partner in this debate will never actually see this column, heh heh.

The topic was, as stated, the Minnesota Timberwolves’ future. A frustrated fan sought empathy from Simmons in a pleading email that dissected a bit of the infamous 50% season-ticket discount the Wolves are pitching which BiE had a look at last week.

Continue Reading…

Mentally battered and otherwise worked over since this morning’s 4am True Hoop live blogging, BallinEurope nevertheless wanted to post *something* with which the loyal readers might waste some time on Saturday.

And so, ladies and gentlemen, the token YouTube video highlight collection post of the day.

The Euroleague Top 10 Plays of the Week clip was again dutifully uploaded onto the ‘Tube and so runs below the break. Is Ricky in it? Yes, and Pops is, too, plus an awesome Viktor Khyrapa block that BiE *knew* would be in here as soon as it happened, awesome three-way passing work by Partizan, and Linas Kleiza creating one of the greatest highlights off a missed free throw ever.

Continue Reading…

The WNBA’s Atlanta Dream yesterday announced they’d acquired the rights to BallinEurope fave Team Hungary/MiZo Pécs guard Dalma Iványi from the San Antonio Silver Stars for center Michelle Snow.

Iványi is currently good for a line of 11.1 points, 3.8 rebounds and 5.7 assists per game in the Hungarian league; in 13 games’ worth of Euroleague Women play, she was good for 7.6 ppg and a sliver under 7.5 rpg. Iványi really crashed the sports headlines last week when she went for a triple-double of 24/11/10 against EL final four team Wisla Can-Pack.

Continue Reading…