Novica Velickovic 35
The BallinEurope Sunday playoff quadruple-header (plus Fearless Predictions)
All right, on this last World Cup-free weekend for the foreseeable future, who’s up for a little basketball? No, make that a lot of basketball. A barrage of basketball, if you will. Get ready to clear the schedule, stock up the liquid refreshment and blow off the familial obligations for the hoops marathon we like […]
Darko, Teodosic, Velickovic, Krstic on Team Serbia preliminary roster for FIBA Worlds
Darko will be there. So will MVP Teodosic, prospective draft pick Novica Velickovic, longtime international Nenad Krstic and BallinEurope fave Uros Tripkovic – we’re talking Team Serbia here, with these four are among the 22 players selected by head coach Dusan Ivkovic to comprise the team to compete in this summer’s 2010 FIBA World Championship. […]
In afterglow of Baskonia OT playoff win, high praise for Tiago Splitter
Checked out the Caja Laboral Baskonia-Real Madrid game on Sunday as part of BallinEurope’s personal playoff tripleheader (the ACB semifinal was bumpered by Lakers-Suns NBA Western Conference Championship game six and game two of the Olympiacos-Panathinaikos EΣAKE championship) and thoroughly enjoyed Madrid’s last gasp in the 2009-10 season spirited late comeback to send the game […]
Euroleague Final Four head-to-head matchups: Partizan Belgrade vs. Olympiacos
Whoa, the Final Four starts in two days? Almost unbelievable. But enough digression! Yesterday, BallinEurope presented a brief position-by-position rundown of Friday’s FC Barcelona-CSKA Moscow game. Today, a consideration of the late game, Partizan Belgrade vs. Olympiacos. Similarly to the early game, Partizan-Olympiacos also features a matchup between classic plucky underdog versus season-starting prohibitive favorite. […]
Baskonia brings too much Splitter, Huertas; drops Madrid to 3rd in ACB
A frustrating second half of the season just got a bit worse for Real Madrid as Los Blancos dropped an absolutely critical home game to Caja Laboral Baskonia, to complete a slow descent from an 11-0 start in the ACB and land the team in third place on the ACB table with two games left […]
The Frank Euroleague roundup: Top 16 finales
Better late than never (totally BiE’s fault, let me tell you) comes Ball in Europe’s dispatch from Francesco Cappelletti rounding up the week that was in Euroleague basketball. For your amusement and edification, Francesco discusses, among other topics, the Terrell McIntyre Backup Curse, which teams should sweep into the Final Four, why Maccabi Tel Aviv […]
Sound bites in advance of Copa del Rey tournament
The party’s already starting in Bilbao to be sure … after all, the Copa del Rey basketball tournament isn’t just a sporting event; heck, it’s not even just another national cup competition. Instead, the “King’s Cup” consumes much of the national population’s attention as determines the class of Europe’s top hoops superpower is confirmed. Concerts […]
Gasol FIBA Men’s Player of the Year, wins both expert and popular vote
BiE supposes the only suspense with this award this year was how close things would get and who placed second. So, after the ho-hum announcement that Pau Gasol was chosen FIBA Europe Men’s Player of the Year for a second consecutive time, we today know the answers. In order, then: Not very close at all, […]
The Frank Euroleague Roundup: Top 16, week three
With a scene-shifting week three of Euroleague Top 16 play in the books, BallinEurope’s Francesco Cappelletti defines his surprise, from Montepaschi’s masterful play to Sasha Kaun’s success to the curse of a Panathinaikos title defense, and more. Read on! Pianigiani’s lesson to Messina “I think it was a masterpiece from my players. One of the […]
The ACB's top five plays of the week
On a bit of a slow news day, Ball in Europe can at least offer you some the top five plays from this weekend’s ACB action. The official website promises much “shameless delight” in this grab bag of magic passing and alley-oops. As they rhetorically ask, “¿Te lo vas a perder?” Click “Continue Reading” for […]
Fantasy tips from the Euroleague boss, week 8
Hello everybody, this is Javier Gancedo, ready to do the last weekly SportingBet Fantasy Challenge column in this 2009. It’s been quite an eventful week for me, and this is why this is being published a bit late. First of all, it was my birthday on Monday: I just turned 36 and celebrated all weekend […]
The Frank Euroleague roundup, week six
Wrapping up and putting a bow on week six of Euroleague basketball is BallinEurope’s man in Italy, Francesco Cappelletti, who today writes of Kleiza & Papaloukas, the Partizan player-making machine, and the league’s three biggest flops thus far in 2009-10. Dear old Theo Linas Kleiza has made us witnesses to what a former NBA sixth […]