The narrative will, naturally, be about how Olympiacos lost last year’s Euroleague title game. The reality is about the focus on the now and what the Reds need to take that extra step in Berlin.
When your semi-final match-up is a repeat of last year’s title game, minds will naturally wander to the revenge game story. The truth is that this is a very different Olympiacos side to the one that made it to the Euroleague Final Four a year ago. The result makes the Reds a side worth paying close attention to in Berlin.
Big changes but still top contenders
The outgoings from Olympiacos last season were substantial, to put it mildly. Sasha Vezenkov, the Euroleague MVP, left for the NBA. Kostas Sloukas, the floor general, crossed the city to join Panathinaikos.
Rather than try to replace them directly with single arrivals, Olympiacos took a far less panicked approach. The Reds went with seeking to replace the aggregate contribution of those two players rather than find direct copies, because those copies weren’t on the market.
It took Oly a while, quite a while, to figure things out. The in-season arrival of Filip Petrusev proved crucial to the process. The result was a team that didn’t have the air of inevitability of the side a year prior but one capable of outlasting anyone. Through the playoff series against FC Barcelona, we saw the best and worst of that. Now it’s single elimination ball time.
Quite the run for Georgios Bartzokas
The Olympiacos head coach has brought the Reds to a third straight Euroleague Final Four. During that run, the Reds have swept every domestic honour. The most notable, when looking at this weekend, of those is taking this season’s Greek Cup. With Panathinaikos on the rise again, Bartzokas was able to snuff out their challenge when it came to the first major honour of the year.
That points to a solid mental resolve within the Reds coach. He’s taken his licks as a head coach. After leading Olympiacos to the 2013 championship, the chess master led Lokomotiv Kuban on a surprising run to the Final Four in 2016. There followed somewhat forgettable stints with FC Barcelona and Khimki before what has been a triumphant return home.
No matter what happens in Berlin, Bartzokas Ball has undoubtedly been a success in the second act with Olympiacos. Three straight Final Fours and maintaining clear dominance over Panathinaikos through more than two seasons is a lot on the good side of the ledger. A second Euroleague title, of course, would bring him to a different level entirely.
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More than revenge
Nobody, at least nobody sensible, from an Olympiacos side of things feels they were robbed last year. When Sergio Llull made the game winner, nobody was crying foul. It was just a matter of frustration. That he’d done it again and Olympiacos had failed to win its best shot at the Euroleague title in a decade.
That’s why I don’t think of this as a revenge game. If anything, the Reds will take revenge on themselves. They want to punish the memory of what could have been with something magical.
Psychologically, that gives them something to work with that Real Madrid don’t have. Los Blancos had a bunker mentality going into Kaunas last year, because of all the things that happened in their playoff series. This time, it’s Oly who have the something more in the mind to drive them.
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Single elimination changes the dynamic
Were this a five game series, overcoming Real Madrid would appear too big a task to manage for the Reds. Fortunately for Olympiacos, this is the Euroleague Final Four and not the Euroleague best of whatever playoffs.
That means Olympiacos can play smart from underneath in this one and essentially dare Real Madrid to slip. With every other team, the discussion is about the possibilities for the whole weekend. With the Reds, the conversation stays naturally locked on this game.
Maybe it’s because nobody wants to jinx the idea of a Greek derby in the final. In truth, it’s because Oly are facing the biggest dog in the yard. The team everyone has said will be the best team in Europe all season. It’s also the one that has lived up to that moniker. It won’t both the Reds because they did the same last year and it wasn’t enough. Mentally, Olympiacos are ready to roll the dice and see what happens in Berlin.
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