BallinEurope, the European Basketball news site

BallinEurope just got the word on a couple of American ballers plying the trade in Finland, namely Emmanuel Holloway and Allen Durham of the Salon Vilpas Vikings. Sure, BiE’ll give ‘em some space!

A former Illinois State Redbird, Holloway came to Vilpas after stints with Basketbol Brno of the Czech Republic and Germany’s Pro B team Hannover. Holloway is currently enjoying a breakout season with the Vikings, leading the team in minutes (34.2), points (20.6), and steals (1.7), while also contributing 4.4 boards and 3.0 assists per game. Below runs either a very short documentary or a very long player profile on Holloway by YouTube user/Vilpas Vikings enthusiast Karupappa.

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So 2011 may have been few people’s favorite year personally, European basketball fans have certainly got to be taking solace in the fact that the past 12 months featured a seriously great run of Continental-flavored hoops.

To wit, in 2011, we enjoyed:

• an exciting round of Euroleague playoffs which included FC Barcelona’s surprising tournament-round exit and culminated in storied franchise Panathinaikos bagging its third EL trophy in five years;

• in domestic leagues, another weird Bundesliga playoff tournament, another controversial Greek tourney, and from Italy and Spain second-place shockers Bennet Cantù and Bizkaia Bilbao Basket advancing;

• lots of European superstars battling it out in the NBA playoffs, particularly on the Western Conference side, with Tony Parker, Pau Gasol, Marc Gasol, Joakim Noah, Luol Deng and of course Dirk Nowitzki proving so key to their teams’ successes (or lack thereof);

• the Eurobasket 2011 tournament hosted in the world’s basketball-maddest country which ultimately inspired Team Serbia coach Dusan Ivkovic to opine that “this has been the strongest European Championship in history…” (and, judging only from the star content alone, BiE would probably agree, despite a general loathing for such hyperbole directly after an event);

• some awesome schadenfreude-laced moments as NBA refugees came to play on the Continent during the player lockout, plus all the incredibly amusing speculation on names beginning with Kobe Bryant; and finally

• the close to the 2011-12 Euroleague regular season with a week 10 that featured some crazy dogfights for entry and positioning in the Top 16 round, including a great do-or-die game between Emporio Armani Milano and Partizan Belgrade.

Olympic Games or no, how can basketball year 2011 be topped? On the first day of the new year, BallinEurope takes a last brief look back at the most popular stories we ran in 2011. Relive one killer 365 days of European roundball once more below.

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BallinEurope just received word from Hippo Taatila (via BiE pilgrim father Christophe, now of European Prospects) that Ron Artest may have topped himself in wackiness yet again – and this within a week of the announcement of his imminent name change to Metta World Peace. Reports Taatila:

“Finland’s top league Korisliiga will witness some serious NBA talent in September 2011, when Los Angeles Lakers forward/multipersonality Ron Artest will join league newcomer LoKoKo Loimaa.

“The 31-year old Artest has three years left in his Lakers contract, but that doesn’t seem to bother LoKoKo sports director Aleksi Valavuori, who backs up the rumor in Tuesday’s Ilta-Sanomat newspaper.

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I mean, besides him...

O, what the heck, BiE’ll go ahead and list them all with home countries and current Estonian team in parentheses: Curtis Allen (USA, Voru KK); Richard Anderson (CAN/Jamaica, BC Rakvere Tarvas); Casey Archibald (CAN, TTU/Kalev Tallinn); Andrew Arnold (USA, TTU/Kalev II); Osby Bambale (USA/Senegal, TTU/Kalev Tallinn); Anthony Brown (USA, Valga/CKE Inkasso); Michael Dunigan (USA, Kalav/Cramo); Callistus Eziukwu (USA, Tartu Rock); Matthew Hall (USA, BC Rakvere Tarvas); Brett McGee (USA, BC Rakvere Tarvas); Armands Skele (LAT, Kalev/Cramo); Andrais Thornton (USA, Voru KK); Georgi Tsintsadze (GEO, Tartu Rock); and Derek Winston (USA, Valga/CKE Inkasso).

The survey considered some 349 clubs in 29 European domestic leagues, omitting associations playing a “fairly low level” of basketball, such as Armenia and Norway; also not considered where the leagues of the former Yugoslavia, as citizenship issues have made the whole foreigner/homegown question fuzzy in cases of dozens of players.

Some key findings included the following.

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This jam forbidden in Finland

Theron Wilson, formerly of Bradley University, has found a nice niche in Finland with the Salon Vilpas Vikings, though perhaps someone should have informed him of the stinginess of Korisliiga referees. It appears that, unlike the Ukrainian ball Wilson was with in his rookie professional season last year, Finland’s zebras just aren’t accustomed to play above the rim – and the Americans’ tendency to destroy a loitering opponent underneath.

In last week’s game against BiE fave Honka Espoo Playboys, Wilson puts his prowess on display to come from out of nowhere, grab the board off a Harris Dejuan miss and, in Waltonian vernacular, throws it down!

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League play is now accelerating to a close all over The Continent, and BallinEurope’s “List of European Champions” page gets more updates.

Most men’s domestic leagues have completely closed up shoppe for 2009-10, but BiE has also listed a few details on where other leagues stand at present; links are provided where possible.

If no information follows a country’s name, that simply means BiE has yet to find anything on the basketball league there. However, this page will be updated throughout the next couple of weeks as associations close the books on the 2009-10 season; watch this space for updates, as they say.

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It’s Academy Awards time on the other side of The Pond tonight, Hollywood’s celebration of itself (approximately 96% of a given broadcast) and movie magic in general (the remaining 4% minus obligatory sponsor plugs). So, on Tinseltown’s holiday, BallinEurope takes stock of the major international and, um, not so-international basketball-related cinematic releases of 2009.

We may as well just call these the nominations for the 2009 Ball in Europe annual Best Basketball Movie; indeed, these eight films represent a smaller bunch than the entire “Best Motion Picture” nominations pool.

Quite the disappointing year it was for the Hollywood basketball flick, too. Not only was there a distinct absence of slick crowd-pleasers like “Glory Road” or marketable hits like “Semi-Pro,” but the sole movie produced by Hollywood in 2009 is the groan-inducing “17 Again.”

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Gorbunova says Ukraine advances

The draw for FIBA EuroBasket 2011 Qualifying Round games in the men’s and women’s competitions is over, and the reactions are pouring in.

The men’s half will consist of three groups of five teams each. Group A has Finland, Israel, Italy, Latvia and Montenegro; Group B is Bosnia & Herzegovina, Great Britain, Hungary, FYR Macedonia and Ukraine; while Group C squares off Belgium, Bulgaria, Georgia, Poland and Portugal.

Naturally, following the draw, all quotebooks were open with plenty of comments filling FIBAEurope.com cyberspace today.

Team Great Britain coach Chris Finch, citing his team’s last performance in a “group of death” scenario, stated confidently that “With everyone available and the ability to prepare for this campaign correctly, I see no reason why we can’t be one of the main contenders for qualifying.” Good man, Finch! Now get to it before the 2012 London Games, there’s a good fellow.

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Like any blog, Ball in Europe would ultimately mean nothing without its readership; you are the ones for whom our website is for. In the general taking stock of the year that was, Ball in Europe today presents the top 10 most popular posts on the website in 2009. These are the stories that captured readers’ imagination greatest and sometimes even managed to amuse.

Please enjoy this varied (and slightly strange, overall) rerun of our calendar year with Ball in Europe’s 10 Most Popular Stories of 2009.

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December 1, 2009, will go down in history as the day the Treaty of Lisbon was put into full effect, thus “complet[ing] the process started by the Treaty of Amsterdam [1997] and by the Treaty of Nice [2001] with a view to enhancing the efficiency and democratic legitimacy of the Union and to improving the coherence of its action.” Indeed, this document can even be said to complete a 52-year-old plan first formulated with the European Economic Community established in Rome in 1957.

The implications and results of the Treaty of Lisbon are certain to be far-reaching, even reaching like Moses Malone into the world of European and international basketball. Ball in Europe takes a look at past, present and future in European Union sports regulation and legislation.

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