BallinEurope, the European Basketball news site

You want a buzzer-beater? BallinEurope’s got your buzzer-beater right here, courtesy of Benetton Basket’s Jobey Thomas.

First, to set the table a bit for the thriller-capping final bucket in this week’s Eurocup match between the visiting Italian side and Lokomotiv Kuban: Benetton had trailed throughout the Group L matchup before finally putting together a 14-1 run to close out the third quarter and enter the final ten minutes up 55-53.

After some nip-and-tuck, Benetton found itself with a two-point deficit with 3.4 seconds remaining on the game clock. Taking the ball out of bounds after a timeout, Sani Becirovic appeared to have been ordered to look for a game-winning shot opportunity. (Gutsy call by coach Aleksandar Djordjevic; while common wisdom says to play for the win on the road, still. Gutsy.)

With 19 points already to his credit, Thomas broke free from his defender thanks to beautiful pick by Benjamin Ortner and found an open spot on the left side beyond the arc. Though Ali Traore came over to defend Thomas, well, just recall that old basketball axiom about never leaving your feet too soon…

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Despite receiving a nomination for the 2011 Big East first team in his senior year, former Georgetown Hoyas guard Austin Freeman went undrafted by the NBA and so flew overseas to play for Libertas Fulgor Forli’, a team based in a small North Italian city and playing in the second-division Legadue. Enrico Cellini met with Freeman at the gym after a recent practice session to chat with him about his new life on and off the court.

General managers of European powerhouses tend to distrust American players out of university, as their teams cannot afford to await the player’s adaptation to a system that’s all about team execution. This is why even young talented players with prestigious college résumés may have to start professionally in the provinces of Europe.

A big Carmelo Anthony fan, former Hoya Austin Freeman is a powerful 6’3” (190.5 cm) guard with a wide shooting range: “I think I’m more like a Joe Johnson type of player, but I like watching many players and try to take a little something out of them.” Last season, his senior year as a Hoya, Freeman scored 17.6 points per game and joined Kemba Walker in the backcourt of the All Big East First Team.

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February will see Turin playing host to the Coppa Italia, a grueling four-day tournament featuring Italy’s top eight teams. With the matchups now determined, BallinEurope’s man in Italy, Enrico Cellini, provides a brief preview of the competition.

The first half of Serie A season is over and the table is set for a little appetizer to the final playoffs. In Turin, from February 16th to 19th, the top eight teams of the 2011-12 season’s first half will play each other in elimination games to conquer the Coppa Italia, the second-most important national trophy and litmus paper of each team’s ambitions.

The teams and matchups are as follows.

Montepaschi Siena (1) vs Banco di Sardegna Sassari (8)
EA7 Milano (4) vs Canadian Solar Bologna (5)
Scavolini Siviglia Pesaro (2) vs Umana Venezia (7)
Bennet Cantù (3) vs Sidigas Avellino (6)

Will this be an opportunity for Montepaschi Siena to reassert its dominance after a few unexpected losses or a chance for rampant new challengers to prepare for an assault on the throne?

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BallinEurope’s man in Italy, Enrico Cellini, contributes quite a bizarre story out of league basketball there. (To think that Cibona Zagreb fans merely created an interesting image in protest of their team’s poor play.) The headline gives away the punchline so BiE won’t forestall this tale’s telling further … um, enjoy.

On January 2, Scavolini Siviglia Pesaro (then 6-6 in Italy) was supposed to be fully focused on preparing for the toughest match of the season, i.e. the Serie A game against almighty juggernaut and five-time repeat champions Montepaschi Siena. Nobody could have ever expected that the greatest challenge for the team would come from outside the court.

On the morning of the game, Pesaro officials informed media that head of a pig had been left in front of Scavolini Pesaro basketball operations offices by an indignant anonymous fan or group of fans (or rather, more appropriately, “fanatic” or “fanatics”).

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Spanish-language Blog de Basket has quite the compelling story running today, particularly for Los Angeles Lakers and Toronto Raptors fans; the problem is that BallinEurope.com cannot seem to confirm the story’s veracity or the source reportage.

According to Il ‘Blog, the Raptors have advanced an offer of Andrea Bargnani and Jose Calderon to the Lakers for Pau Gasol and Derek Fisher. Supposedly, the San Antonio Spurs are also interested in making a deal for Gasol, which would be quite the bizarre transaction, indeed. (Who comes to L.A.? Tony Parker?)

The story quotes no less than John Hollinger of ESPN.com as having confirmed this rumor, but without linkage.

Update: BiE wishes a big “thank you” to Mr. Hollinger, who dropped us an email this morning (CET time) on this subject. Not surprisingly, Hollinger had nothing to do with the unsubstantiated rumor, explaining that “I have no connection at all to this Toronto-Pau stuff. There was a commenter fraudulently posting with my name and [another website] decided this made it valid. Please stop attributing this nonsense to me.”

Guess Pau ain’t going anywhere. For the time being.

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BallinEurope’s Enrico Cellini gives us some excellent highlights from a recent interview between his countryman Danilo Gallinari of the Denver Nuggets and Italy-based daily Gazzetta dello Sport. Gallinari is nicely candid in the piece on topics ranging from the comparison of the ladies in Milan, New York and Denver to el jefe himself, NBA commissioner David Stern. Read on for some Danilo, translated but uncensored…

In an interview with Gazzetta dello Sport, Danilo Gallinari goes through his lifestyle in Denver: “I want to live downtown – I’m looking for a house.” Regarding food, a crucial issue for every Italian abroad, he says, “I have been doing some ‘scouting’: I found a couple of pretty good restaurants. One is downtown and is managed by an Italian guy. The other one is in Cherry Creek, a neighborhood full of shops and fun places. It’s the closest thing you can get to Corso Como,” recalling a commercial street in the center of Milan, very close to where he was living during his term with Euroleague club Emporio Armani Milano.

The comparison with the more glamorous Milan and New York to Denver comes inevitably. “Yeah, I’m feeling the difference,” says Gallinari. “We are in the provinces here. I need to get used to it. They send you to bed earlier – which is positive – and there is less temptation. Women are less aggressive, you might need to fall in love,” he jokes.

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Though Žalgiris Kaunas club director/former interim coach Vitoldas Massalski has categorically stated that no changes to the Greens’ roster will be forthcoming until the end of the Euroleague regular season, this can hardly stop the speculative future-gazing in Lithuania and beyond.

To wit: Yesterday, the Lietuvos Rytas website ran a report stating that Milovan Rakovic could be heading back from loan to his contracted club Montepaschi Siena in January. Siena would naturally like to bolster up in the middle for a deep run into the Euroleague playoffs in lieu of the injured Ksistof Lavrinovic.

Žalgiris’ prospects for advancement aren’t exactly dim, but they’re currently mired at the bottom of Group B, in a three-way tie with Brose Baskets Bamberg and KK Zagreb at 2-5. Losses vs. Panathinaikos tonight and Bamberg next week would certainly doom the Greens to elimination; even a 2-1 finish by the Lithuanian side might not be enough.

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Coming to America

Messina began his career in Italy but then started “to feel uneasy” with his native basketball environment. “Moscow was the place where I felt the best,” he explains. In Russia, we won championships on the road, celebrated on the court with rival fans applauding us. In Italy, this would be inconceivable. In Spain, they are passionate, too, but for sure there is not the acrimony we have in Italy.”

Though, even Spain was tough sometimes to digest: “I wasn’t happy with basketball matters and I felt like a stranger. I was bothered by the fact that when we won, I was Ettore Messina. When we lost, I was ‘the Italian’.”

On the NBA, Messina’s future home: “I am curious and worried. Curious to experience the day-to-day life of the NBA, to coach great players. Worried because I hope I get accepted by others. I hope I’m ready – we’re finally getting started.”

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Still pining...

According to Corriere della Sport via Sportando, Sabatini still can’t get the L.A. Laker off his mind. Runs the quote: “We had the agreement, there was just a little detail left. He was supposed to arrive yesterday, play today and leave tomorrow. Three days, one game, but we would sell out Unipol Arena and make €1.5 million. Our first offer for Kobe was $800,000 for two months then we offered him around $3 million for four days.”

Well, BiE’s not too familiar with the $3 million offer but one wonders if Bryant himself was aware about an “agreement,” which, to be honest, was most probably purely in Sabatini’s fevered imagination.

And in an alternate universe, BiE is scheduling his evening around finding a satellite broadcast of Serie A games in Hungary…

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Emporio Armani Milano sits at a dismal 2-4 in Euroleague play and now marquee name Danilo Gallinari is departing the club … so what’s next? How about coaxing the top prospect in Italy, Alessandro Gentile? Enrico Cellini reports.

Emporio Armani Milan knew that sooner or later it would have had to deal with the loss of NBA lockout refugee Danilo Gallinari, but no one expected this moment would take place in such troubled waters. The team has shown poor chemistry, losing four of its first six Euroleague games to compromise the chances of getting to the EL Top 16.

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