BallinEurope, the European Basketball news site

Cue Estudiantes fans: "If only..."

According to Spain-based Sentimiento Amarillo y Naranja, Liga Endesa club Asefa Estudiantes is in the hunt to sign Lamar Odom, who arranged a deal with the Dallas Mavericks last weekend that would allow the disgruntled forward to be listed for the remainder of the season as “inactive.”

Sentimiento reports Estudiantes representatives as having been in contact with Odom’s representatives and have been given a 48-hour window in which the player might accept the offer – though as far as BallinEurope knows, Odom’s contract with the Mavericks won’t allow him to go to any other team.

Estudiantes has just added former Unicaja Malaga/Real Madrid player Louis Bullock and is waiting on a response from Will McDonald, currently with Philippines side Petron Blaze Boosters.

Whatever happens, Estudiantes better come up with ways to win soon: The team sits in 17th place on the Spanish league table and is well within the relegation zone at 2½ games behind UCAM Murcia with six games to play.

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In the leadup to the 2011-12 Eurocup Final Four tournament beginning on Saturday, Eurosport Turkey basketball commentator Uygar Karaca contributes a series of previews on the remaining quartet entitled “Four Teams, Four Stories” to BallinEurope. Today, Karaca takes a look at Valencia BC.

Of course, we have to mention brilliant coaches like Luis Casimiro, Paco Olmos and Fotis Katsikaris when we talk about Valencia. However, it is very obvious that some ex-Yugoslavian coaches will always have a special place in the hearts of Valencians.

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Eurosport Turkey basketball commentator Uygar Karaca was naturally on hand in Istanbul for the FIBA Euroleague Women Final Four tournament. Today, BallinEurope posts his impressions on the competition and what the future may hold for the contenders.

After long, exhausting league play in Euroleague Women, the intense traffic of the Final Eight round has now ended. Who won it in İstanbul? The Spanish. But we already know that from the de facto semifinals: Ros Casares Valencia made it 3-for-3 with the win against Spartak Moscow Vidnoje while Rivas Ecopolis clinched first place in its group by beating both the Turkish powerhouses, first Galatasaray and second Fenerbahçe. Below runs a summary of some important highlights from the tournament.

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Amidst Blusens Monbus’ 82-63 blowout of Mad-Croc Fuenlabrada in Liga Endesa play last night, 39 year-old Bernard “Mister Récord” Hopkins logged one of the season’s more bizarre stat lines. Read his bit of the boxscore: 14 points on 4-of-6 overall shooting and 6-of-7 on FTs; four rebounds; one assist; one steal; five (!) fouls drawn; and a 21 performance index rating. Odder yet, all of the above was done in just under 15 minutes of court time. Weirdest of all, despite doin’ good work, Hop’s +/- stat was minus-7 for the game, making him the sole Blusens player with a mark under +5.

The 21 PIR set the Liga Endesa record as the highest mark ever achieved under 15 minutes and was a personal statistical high since 2008-09.

BallinEurope thus takes the occasion to go over the man’s bio, as did the Liga Endesa official website this morning. ¡But first, the highlights! About 47 seconds worth of Hopkins’ stuff in the Fuenladrada game may be seen here (guess it’s not easy to put together a reel of drawn fouls), while game highlights run below.

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Wow, we’re really already talking about the 2012-13 free-agency period? And now that Maccabi is up two games to one on Panathinaikos in their playoff series they’re reading to sever ties with a key component?

Apparently, both bylines may be true, as sports talent agency/advisory firm You First Sports announced last night that “Andy Miller, Richard Hendrix’s agent, would like to communicate that from today the negotiations talks between Hendrix, his agent and Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv are broken and that from now on we will evaluate Richard’s options when he becomes a free agent after this season.”

BallinEurope wonders what bridges were burned there…

Spain-based Blog de Basket takes the story and runs with it a bit more, claiming Hendrix has gotten offers from big clubs in Europe, including Real Madrid and FC Barcelona.

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Over in that other sport, FC Barcelona’s Lionel Messi is hot enough on the international level to have earned the sobriquet “greatest of all-time” from Barca manager Pep Guardiola; hype is high enough that Guardian UK readers are calling Messi better (by far) than the likes of Diego Maradona, Pele, Johan Cryuff, Zinedine Zidane and (sigh) Ferenc Puskas. A recently rolled-out advertising campaign by nutrional product supplier Herbalife suggests, however, that Messi secretly desires to excel on the basketball court.

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Is Europe’s reputed top domestic league actually under threat from within? According to the excellent Spanish-based website Tu Basket, representatives of nine Liga Endesa clubs – Lagun Aro GBC, Fuenlabrada, Lycentum Alicante, FIATC Joventut, Valladolid, Asefa Estudiantes, Gran Canaria 2014, Assignia Manresa, and CAI Zaragoza – are meeting in Madrid today to discuss alleged unfair financial regulation within and possible contraction under sweeping “economic control measures” currently being considered by the league and commissioner Albert Agusti.

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BiE already submitted a Euroleague tournament bracket, but while a chance remains to put forth a few Official BallinEurope Fearless Predictions™ on the EL playoff round, well, BiE’ll take it.

Over at Euro-Step, this writer takes part in the regular “Wiseman Know” column (I know, I know) along with the likes of former EL title-winner Tomas van den Spiegel, Slovenian head coach Luka Bassin, BallinEurope.com pilgrim father Christophe Ney and Euroleague Adventures’ irrepressible Nick Gibson, among others. This week’s assignment for each of us wise guys was to predict the outcome of the four best-of-five EL playoff series – at Twitter-sized length, naturally. The remainder of the prognostications may be found here, while BiE’s run below.

(Incidentally, before the scoffing begins, please note that all four of the teams picked way back in October by BallinEurope to make the Final Four round are still alive – though the Panathinaikos-Maccabi series will take at least one out…)

FC Barcelona vs. Unics Kazan – Kazan’s had a nice run, but no one’s stopping this Blaugrana side yet. FC Barcelona, 3 games to 0.

Panathinaikos vs. Maccabi Tel Aviv – What a matchup of starting 5s, coaching, history … a grind-it-out series goes to the last bucket in game 5. PAO, 3-2.

CSKA Moscow vs. Gescrap Bilbao Basket – Bilbao’s had a nice run, but no one’s stopping this Big Red Machine yet. (Whoa, deja vu…) CSKA Moscow, 3-0.

Montepaschi Siena vs. Olympiacos – Olympiacos might be able to run with Siena, but Montepaschi’s got too many weapons & too much experience for Reds to contend with.

Or, in simplified version: Booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo MC-CAY-LEBB! Montepaschi Siena, 3-1.

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A moment of silence, please, in memory of Ricky Rubio’s 2011-12 season.

After Rubio suffered an injury in Friday night’s game against the Los Angeles Lakers, Minnesota Timberwolves fans held their collective breath, and the Human YouTube Highlight Clip got another video added to his virtual collection – one that La Pistola certainly never wanted to see.

Yesterday, the team was forced to announce that Rubio in fact had torn his left ACL, an injury that ends his NBA season with a surprising Timberwolves side who’d gotten as high as no. 8 in the Western Conference. Worse yet for international hoops fans, Rubio will miss the entire 2012 Olympic Games, a bit of blow to Team Spain.

National team head coach Sergio Scariolo was quoted on Saturday morning as stating that “I woke up to the bad news this morning, although there remains the slight hope that it isn’t too serious.” Of course, it ultimately was.

Spain-based website Te Interesa contemplates Sergio Scariolo’s moves for the Olympics, with Jose Calderon suddenly thrust from a platoon role to full-time starter. The website also reckons that Real Madrid’s Sergio Llull might be shifted to the no. 2 spot, while Team Spain will certainly have to deemphasize the playmaker role – the latter of which BiE figures is a strategy tantamount to death in international ‘ball.

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Not only did Kevin Love put in a superstar-level 39-point, 17-rebound performance in his Minnesota Timberwolves’ 95-94 win over the Los Angeles Clippers last night, he also has BallinEurope’s informal Tweet Of The Week award locked up on Tuesday. And the 141-characters-or-less bit of pithiness is (drumroll, please) …

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