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Mere hours remain before the next level of Euroleague basketball – the expanded Top 16 round – tips off. Thus, BallinEurope has just enough to get in a round of Power Rankings for the big league. This time around, the utter subjective rankings of how the surviving sixteen teams *are currently trending* take into account performance in recent EL and other league games plus some speculation about acquisitions in gearing up for the next phase.
Enjoy the games and let the arguments begin!
Two more nights of play and the Euroleague closes down play for calendar year 2012. With the majority of games on the slate still relevant, even the advancing squads will be playing for positioning in the next draw. And how are the 24 teams trending? BallinEurope takes a pretty much completely subjective look at who’s hot and who’s not going into edge-of-seat time…
1 (↔). FC Barcelona (9-0 in Euroleague play; 7-4 in Liga Endesa). Chalk the squeaker win over the energized Partizan side up to the absence of Erazem Lorbek (and perhaps a bit of backfired strategy by coach Dusko); in four games prior, the Blaugrana outscored opponents by an average of over 23 points. Including CSKA. And Lorbek’s back tonight.
2 (↔). CSKA Moscow (8-1 EL; 7-1 VTB United League). CSKA has righted the ship and rounded into shape well since the week 5 loss to Barça. Forget winning every game in EL and VTB play since then; Lietuvos Rytas is the only side to get within double figures of the geared-up Red Army since then.
BallinEurope hasn’t done this lately, so on the eve of the 2012-13 Euroleague season’s penultimate round of regular-season play, the BiE EL Power Rankings run below. Quick recap of the rules: The rankings are based on the way current teams are *trending* and not necessarily overall quality. Recent play in Euroleague games is the most important consideration in these ultimately subjective rankings, but play in other leagues was also factored in.
Who’s riding waves of prosperity and who’s going under for the third time? Read on and enjoy this week’s slate of games!
Everyone else is doing it, so why shouldn’t we? With the NBA season tipping off next week, BallinEurope’s man in Britain, Sam Chadwick, gets into the spirit of things as he analyzes offseason moves and roster makeups in the big league – and ranks all 30 teams. While Sammy’s top three is pretty standard stuff, things get interesting quickly, and BiE just loves how he’s positioned the Eurowolves and Euronuggets for the upcoming season … Get your arguments ready and read on!
1. Miami Heat
Last season’s champions not only benefit from the continued development of Lebron James, who was one of the best if not the best player at the London Olympic Games in becoming the first Team USA player to record a triple double: The Heat also add one of the association’s best shooters of all-time in Ray Allen plus another dependable shooter/scorer in Rashard Lewis, the same guy who, yes is a little past his prime, but one who can give you career averages of 16 points, 5.6 rebounds and can hit 39% from deep.
2. Los Angeles Lakers
For a team that was ravaged in 2011-12 by a preseason mishap revolving around Chris Paul and his vetoed trade, followed by a conference semifinals 4-1 spanking from the Oklahoma City Thunder, who took game one by 29 and finished with an average victory margin of over nearly 10 points. Thanks to that little wakeup call, the Lakers front office decided to work its magic – literally – in taking the Magic’s best player for a song while also adding one of the NBA’s best veteran point guards still very capable of averaging a double-double. With Dwight Howard and Kobe Bryant on his team, Steve Nash will hope that this is his chance to compete, yet again, for a championship.
3. Oklahoma City Thunder
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All right, it’s that time again! With hours to go before the 2012-13 Euroleague season tips off, BallinEurope breaks out its first power ratings for the big league.
Whereas normally a disclaimer to the effect of “the following ratings are based on current trending only and are not necessarily based on the overall quality of the teams” runs here, this year BiE’s switching things up a bit. To wit: For this edition of Euroleague power rankings, the teams *will* be run based on BallinEurope’s totally subjective viewpoint. (Mainly because BiE couldn’t figure out what to do with Barcelona…)
Get your arguments ready and read on for this season’s first power rankings, with Official BallinEurope Fearless Predictions™ for the upcoming season peppered throughout. Enjoy the games!
The favorites
1. Olympiacos Piraeus. The usual reserved spot for the defending champion comes with some justification this year, as Vassilis Spanoulis & Co. show no signs of letting up on their 2011-12 season-ending 22-4 run. In the off-/preseason, Olympiacos’ foursome of Spanoulis, local hero Georgios Printezis, Kostas Papanikolaou and Evengelos Mantazaris suited up for a disappointed Team Greece – all but Mantazaris acquitted themselves nicely, with 50-of-89 (56.2%) overall shooting and Spanoulis dishing out just under six assists per game in three Olympic qualifiers.
It seems like forever, but Euroleague 2011-12 resurrects itself for Top 16 opening night tonight. What better way to celebrate, reckons BallinEurope, than with some good ol’ power rankings?
Once again, the caveat emptor-ish bit: These ratings are formulated from once source (namely yours truly) and are based on the way teams are trending at present. While play in other leagues was considered, emphasis was put on performance in the latter bits of the EL season.
To the rankings!
Top dogs
1. CSKA Moscow (10-0 in Euroleague regular season; 8-1 in VTB United League, 7-1 in PBL) – Remember the date December 10, 2011: That’s the last time the scary Red Army lost, in falling to BC Khimki in Russia while getting just seven minutes out of Andrei Kirilenko. The Red Army’s only loss before that was exactly one month prior when they fell in a squeaker at Spartak St. Petersburg in their VTB opener. Considering the starting team alone – an all-star squad of Kirilenko, Milos Teodosic, Nenad Krstic, Ramunas Siskauskas, Viktor Khryapa – BiE has to wonder what non-NBA team could beat ‘em. Even after the star power, the CSKA Moscow bench contributed 43.2 points per game in Euroleague play while the team leads in overall performance rating, assists and assist-to-turnover ratio. This has got to be considered the team to beat in 2012.
With two Euroleague games in the books for each team and something of an overall picture developing, BallinEurope unleashes the November edition of its ever-“popular” power rankings for the two dozen squads. For reference, edification and jollies, the preseason edition of the ‘rankings may be seen here.
Once again, advisories in effect: These ratings are formulated from once source (namely yours truly) and are based on the way teams are trending at present, i.e. Bennet Cantu is not necessarily *better* per se than Fenerbahçe Ülker, et cetera, et cetera, ad infinitum. While play in other leagues was considered, emphasis was put on performance in each team’s pair of EL games thus far, i.e. BiE knows Union Olimpija is 5-0 in the Adriatic League.
Without further ado, then, let’s get to the rankings! (Žalgiris fans, you may want to consider before clicking “Read More.”)
Right, then. With the last teams advancing into the Euroleague two dozen for the regular season and a break in the Kobe-to-Bologna soap opera today, BallinEurope breaks out an old favorite: power rankings!
Once again, the BallinEurope Euroleague Power Rankings are based on current trends, i.e. who’s hot, who’s not. For this edition of the list, also taken into consideration are offseason acquisitions and a dash of expectations vis-à-vis how these squads will look when the games really start to matter. Let the arguments begin!
1. FC Barcelona – Heard it before? Well, you’ve probably heard about the core of the Barca roster before, too: Juan Carlos Navarro, Pete Mickael, Erazem Lorbek, Victor Sada, Boniface N’dong, Kosta Perovic and Fran Vazquez; getting to add Chuck Eidson and Marcelinho Huertas doesn’t seem fair. In going 8-0 thus far this preseason, the Blaugrana have added to their trophy case with Lliga Catalana and Supercopa Endesa titles and Navarro in particular is still in EuroBasket form. Right now, BiE says this is the team to beat.
