Panathinaikos defeated Fenerbahce and reached the Euroleague final
He Panathinaikos The Greek became the first finalist of the competition Euroleague after the victory Fenerbahce (73-57) in a duel in which was always aheadpartly because his opponent did not take advantage of the opportunities available to him to turn the score around.
Due to access problems, the match started almost half an hour late – an unforeseen event that seemed to be a bigger problem for the Turkish team. Their constant losses and poor accuracy in the trio, something unusual from the moment Sarunas Jasikevicius came on the bench meant that his first basket took more than five minutes. Panathinaikos used this time to reduce the gap (12-2, min.6).
From that point on, the forces were evenly matched, meaning the margins remained stable until the start of the second quarter. This was where Fenerbahce is really starting to show its teethwith a score of 2–7, allowing him to return to the game.
Despite positive momentum, they failed to take the lead once in the first half as The power of Mathias Lessort in both rings and the success of Kendrick Nunn neutralized the fluidity of Nigel Hayes-Davies’ attack. (38-36, min. 20).
Back on the court, Panthinaikos slightly dampened the Ottoman roar, returning to the earlier score of 7-2. It still wasn’t enough to knock down the Istanbul team, which was fully involved in the chase and this was demonstrated by his sticky defense.
Unfortunately for him, his defensive consistency contrasted with a lack of offensive power to back up his comeback. In fact, he had several properties that he should have realized for the first time in the third act, all of which missed opportunities as a result bad day for their shootersfinishing with a poor 9 of 35 (25.7%) from the perimeter, a percentage that Scotty Wilbekin After being denied in front of the rim, he was only able to make one of his ten shots at the basket.
The Greek team did not forgive him for the triple and two free kicks. Panagiotis Kalaitzakis and Lessort’s counter-attacking goal restored their lead to ten points nine minutes before the end (60-50, min. 31). Without too much brilliance, but against a desperate opponent who could only score two points in more than nine minutes. The final part of the match was a walk along the red carpet towards the finale..