BallinEurope, the European Basketball news site

Garcia: Again the top-scorer for Barca

Joventut Badalona had little trouble with China (1-2), forcing the Chinese into 25 turnovers which resulted in Joventut taking 22 more shots in the game. Joventut maintained a double-digit lead for much of the contest. 6’8” Jose Nogues led the winners with 21 points, shooting 8-of-13 on two-pointers. 6’4” Agusti Sans finished with 19 points, seven rebounds and eight assists while 6’5” Alberto Abalde scored 16 and hit three three-pointers. 6’5” Jinglong Li was the only player in double-figures for Team China with 14 points. Joventut came back from a two-point deficit at the end of the first quarter to score 25 in the second to take a ten-point halftime lead.

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The attention Jaycee Carroll got on Saturday’s open media time was well out of proportion to his playing time on Friday night. In about 22 minutes (much of it in garbage time; then again, much of the game was garbage time, ultimately), Carroll contributed just two points – well done from his double-figure scoring averages this season – to Real Madrid’s immolation of CSKA Moscow. Below, a minute with one of the Madridistas’ friendliest, most engaging players…

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Real Madrid’s Marcus Slaughter feels good despite facing the pressure of what he calls – and what unquestionably is – the biggest game of his seven-year professional career. Olympiacos might want to take note, as the defending champs could well have matchup problems in facing up against this athletic big man … particularly if, as he says, speed will be the key to a Euroleague title in 2013…

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Right, then, here’s the big league’s official “best of” clip from last night’s semifinal games, starring Rudy Fernandez, Marcelinho Huertas, Juan Carlos Navarro, Giorgi Shermadini and Nenad Krstic with his only two points in CSKA Moscow’s debacle…

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X-Man: Assalit top scorer in Joventut win

As is typical of this tournament, day two proved a make-or-break for many teams, thanks to a couple surprising results: Team China (now armed with its full roster after playing against Crvena Zvezda/Red Star Belgrade with just seven in game one) eliminated NIJT defending champs Lietuvos Rytas while Joventut Badalona controlled Red Star to put themselves in the driver’s seat of group A. OKK Spars Sarajevo lost to FC Barcelona to put the Blaugrana free and clear in no. 1 position; the point differential between the two clubs is identical and thus a Barca loss plus a win is required to put the tourney’s newbies into the final game on Sunday…

Team China (1-1) surprised Lietuvos Rytas (0-2) 66-57 on the second day of the Euroleague’s Nike International Junior Tournament (NIJT) in London. 6’1” Yufeng Xu (1996) led Team China with 22 points on 8-of-16 shooting and also grabbed 10 rebounds. 6’2” Deividas Kumelis (1995) led Rytas with 17 points and hit two three-pointers. It was a poor shooting game with China shooting 1-of-14 on three-pointers and Rytas only connected on 2-of-18 from deep. Rytas only shot 34.9% on the game and couldn’t take advantage of a 53-40 rebounding edge. Team China used a 17-7 second quarter advantage to take control of the game at the half (33-22).

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After a disappointing no-show by CSKA Moscow in the first Euroleague Final Four game, BallinEurope hopes that the clash of Spanish basketball superpowers lives up to the “Il Classico”…perhaps the biggest news/speculation regards Nathan Jawai, who was such a force in the playoff round for Barca; at least one Spain-based source claims that the big guy will not play at all. With Pete Mickael already out, this cannot be good news.

As for Real Madrid, it seems like ages since they last suited up for a Euroleague game. Will the long respite hurt or help?

Follow along below with BallinEurope and comment at will; enjoy the game, all!

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Okay, so BallinEurope supposes it’s not technically “live blogging” per se, but here will follow live textual coverage of the first Euroleague Final Four game for 2013. And though to man, the Red Army denies any psychological impact or residue of revenge motivates them this game, BiE can’t help but think the disappointment of 2012 isn’t somewhere in mind…

And so what can Euroleague MVP Vassilis Spanoulis engineer this time? We’ll find out very soon now. Join in on the chat here at BallinEurope.com and enjoy the game!

Dusan was devastating

The Euroleague’s 2013 Nike International Junior Tournament started in London today for four first round contests. Defending champion Lietuvos Rytas Vilnius dropped their first game to Joventut, 77-65. 6’5” Alberto Abalde (1995) led Joventut with 21 points, making 3-of-6 three-pointers. 6’8” Jose Nogues (1995) helped out with 11 points and seven rebounds. 6’9” Gediminas Zalalis (1995) led Rytas with 14 points and 6’5” Benas Vaitulionis (1995) had 12 points.

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The eminently quotable Sonny Weems was in fine form before his club’s matchup with Olympiacos in Euroleague Final Four play. See below for his talk with media members in which he downplays the revenge factor going into tonight’s game (of course, Sonny was not one of the half-dozen players who ended up on the wrong side of the big league’s biggest championship upset ever) and speaks of the difference between playing for CSKA Moscow and Žalgiris Kaunas.

And finally, for those who assume that any player worth his salt would automatically eschew European basketball for the NBA, watch to the end for a hint on Weems’ future with the Red Army. (Hint: CSKA fans should be stoked indeed…)

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So does a status as titleholder tend to give a defending champion extra confidence or put extra pressure on the team? Here’s an answer from Kostas Papanikolaou of 2012 Euroleague champs Olympiacos…

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