Nov
1

Sunday bullets: Real Madrid analyzed; Szczerbiak, Boumtje-Boumtje remembered; retro Nike ads return

The "beautiful, enigmatic bastard"

Lazy Sunday? Great: BallinEurope has just the thing to occupy your time! Below run some quality articles and gawk-worthy YouTubes from the week that was in European basketball and NBA lockout land for your perusal. The bullet-point format is in effect and the show stars Danny Green, Ruben Boumtje-Boumtje, Walter Szczerbiak, Spike Lee and Samuel L. Jackson. Enjoy!

• For an excellent and thorough piece on the Real Madrid offense (and concomitant weak interior defense) in light of Thursday night’s Euroleague loss to Maccabi Tel Aviv, check out this work at In The Game. Figures writer Rod Higgins in part: “…it is doubtful that [Real’s] current style will serve them particularly well once the regular season is over. Madrid get most of their wins by simply outscoring their opponents. This means that they have to improve defensively; Bilbao, Milano and Maccabi have repeatedly exposed the weak interior defense of the Merengues earlier in the season…”

• Hey, some positivity for the Lithuanian fans! Roll the top 10 plays by Lietuvos Rytas in October!

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Jun
1

Kestutis Kemzura names 20 to preliminary Team Lithuania roster

He's baaaa-aaaack!

Team Lithuania coach Kestutis Kemzura this morning named 20 players to his preliminary squad in advance of the Eurobasket 2011 tournament. The home team will be returning seven players from the side that took bronze in the 2010 FIBA World Championship and including one NBAer – but not Linas Kleiza.

Returning from the surprise of 2010 are Robertas Javtokas, Mantas Kalnietis, Martynas Pocius, Tomas Delininkaitis, and Paulius Jankunas of Zalgiris Kaunas, plus Martynas Gecevicius and Simas Jasaitis of Lietuvos Rytas. Also named to Kemzura’s preliminary squad is Zalgiris’ Mindaugas Kuzminskas, who was a reserve for the 2010 Team Lithuania.

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May
11

List of 2010-11 European Champions: Return from Barcelona edition

BallinEurope apologizes for the recent two-day drought of content in an attempt to catch up on “the day job” since returning from the Euroleague Final Four tournament. To (hopefully) make up for this dearth a bit, and in honor of Panathinaikos’ stirring win in the big league, BiE today presents an updated version of its List of 2010-11 European Champions.

See below for a roundup on the current situation in regular seasons and/or playoffs in the Continent’s domestic leagues. This list will be updated whenever possible.

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Apr
3

List of 2010-11 European Basketball Champions: Post-Easter holiday edition

Over the long Easter weekend, the playoff picture in several domestic leagues became clearer, some tournaments advanced a round or two and the VTB United League crowned a champion.

Below, BallinEurope supplies information on the current situation in European Leagues’ regular seasons and/or playoffs. This list will be updated whenever possible.

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Apr
5

Video clips: Unics Kazan wins, Real Madrid loses, and YouTube shows how not to dunk

While much of the basketball-loving world was distracted by the squall of opening-round NBA playoff games, the roundball game nevertheless played on in leagues throughout Europe and beyond. Of course, this lead-in mainly serves as an excuse to justify running the below handful of highlights, links and pithy bon mots to (help you waste some time on Monday morning) get your week started correctly (and by “correctly,” BiE means in part ignoring that 109-100 win by the New Orleans Hornets).

• First up, congratulations from BallinEurope go out to Unics Kazan, who became the first unlicensed team to officially join the 2011-12 Euroleague ranks with a decisive 92-77 victory over Cajasol Sevilla in the ULEB Eurocup championship match. Maciej Lampe contributed a huge effort with 26 points and 11 rebounds, while Kelly McCarty went for 18 and Terrell Lyday put in 15. But it was Marko Popović who was named MVP for dishing out a Eurocup championship record 11 assists to go with his 18 points.

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Oct
1

Eurocup 2010-11 teams announced: Greece, Italy, Turkey, Spain place three each

The list of teams that will make up the 2010-11 Eurocup regular seasons is all but complete – 93.75% complete, to be exact, with 30 of the 32 teams now set. The finish of the Eurocup Qualifying Round promoted eight more clubs into the regular season, leaving two more spots open, which will be determined by the final Euroleague qualifiers. BC Khimki holds a huge lead over Le Mans for the first spot, while Alba Berlin looks to dig its way out of a four-point deficit in hosting Spirou Basket on Sunday.

A total of 32 teams will play in the Eurocup regular season: The field is made up of 10 direct qualifiers, 14 from Euroleague qualifying rounds, and eight who earned their way in through Eurocup qualifiers.

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Jul
6

The 35 Greatest Basketball YouTubes of All-Time: Nos. 11-15

It’s a bit of a dunkathon today at BallinEurope as we enter the top 15 of BiE’s official 35 Greatest Basketball YouTubes of All-Time, which were determined by these guidelines. (Usage of “guidelines” in previous sentence is very loose, indeed.)

There’re thrills, chills and a few ills in today’s selection of eminently watchable and rewatchable YouTube videos. Enjoy!

15. Top 10 Dunks over Ruben Boumtje-Boumtje, 2008-09. While Boumtje-Boumtje was a big fan favorite playing for EWE Baskets Oldenburg, his devotees still realized his shortcomings. This fan (really) vid is pretty amazing as a result. You know, it’s hard to believe that “Schadenfreude” is a German word…

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Jul
0

EuroCup 2010-11 qualifying tournament matchups

Along with the Euroleague draws for the 2010-11 season, yesterday also saw the release of the matchups in the EuroCup qualifying tournament bracket. Sixteen teams start in the qualifiers, with eight winners of two-game series advancing to the EuroCup regular season.

The matchups are:

Besiktas Cola Turka vs. Deutsche Bank Skyliners
Hapeol Migdal Jerusalem vs. Belgacom Liege
Aris BSA 2003 vs. PBC Lukoil Academic
Gran Canaria 2014 vs. KK Zagreb Croatia Osiguranje
BC Azovmash Mariupol vs. Entente Orleanaise
BC Spartak vs. PAOK BC
Benetton Basket BWin vs. Apeol Nicosia
Dynamo Moscow vs. Cedevita Zagreb

Games one will be played on September 29, with home and visiting teams switching roles for a second game on October 6.

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Jun
4

Devotion down 3.5 percent: Final 2009-10 Euroleague attendance figures

During the 2009-10 Euroleague season, one of the most watched statistics was totally off-court; with financial stress pervasive throughout The Continent, most European basketball franchises prepared for the worst and tightened belts in expectation of lower turnouts.

And once all was said and done, the results were … mixed. With last season’s biggest draw Alba Berlin not in the competition, the overall 2009-10 Euroleague attendance figures for regular-season/Top 16 play decreased 3.5% overall year-on-year, bringing total attendance just under the 1 million threshold achieved in 2008-09.

(For comparison’s sake, NBA regular-season attendance figures for 2009-10 were down just about 2% against 2008-09.)

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Jun
3

Bauermann names 16 to Team Germany roster; two notable omissions

To little fanfare, the list of players invited to the training camp list for Team Germany was released in advance of the 2010 FIBA World Championship, as the German Basketball Federation (DBB) today posted 16 names invited by Dirk Bauermann. See if you can figure out if anyone’s missing.

Steffen Hamann, Lucca Staiger (ALBA Berlin); Demond Greene (Larissa); Yassin Idbihi, Heiko Schaffartzik (New Yorker Phantoms Braunschweig); Robin Benzing, Per Guenther (ratiopharm Ulm); Philipp Schwethelm (Eisbären Bremerhaven); Chad Toepper (Albuquerque Thunderbirds); Konrad Wysocki (Turow Zgorzelec); Elias Harris (Gonzaga); Jan-Hendrik Jagla (Asseco Prokom); Johannes Strasser, Tim Ohlbrecht (Telekom Baskets Bonn); Tibor Pleiss (Brose Baskets Bamberg); and Christopher McNaughton (EWE Baskets Oldenburg). Plus, “on call” is Patrick Femerling (Antalya BSB).

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