As we approach the midway point of the regular season, the Top 16 races get more heated. This week, the three unbeaten teams will be facing major road tests and Montenegro will be in for a historic night.
Big tests for undefeated
All three unbeaten teams will put their perfect records to the test away from home. Virtus Segafredo Bologna (4-0) visits the winless Telenet Giants Antwerp (0-4) who are in a must-win situation. Antwerp can likely not afford to start the season 0-5, from which no team has ever recovered to make it through to the next phase. The other two undefeated clubs face long trips to engage in high-profile clashes. Group D leader Dolomiti Energia Trento (4-0) will square off against Herbalife Gran Canaria (3-1), while in a clash of former champions, Group A leader Joventut Badalona (4-0) will be tested in Russia by perennial contender UNICS Kazan (3-1). Trento and Gran Canaria have not played each other since the 2017-18 season when they split home wins. Trento captain Toto Forray is the only player who is left on either roster from those clashes. On the other hand, UNICS and Joventut split regular-season wins last season. Veteran center Ante Tomic has been starring for Joventut inside, while veteran sharpshooter Jamar Smith has shined for UNICS from long range. Smith (24.3) and Tomic (24.0) are ranked first and second, respectively, in average PIR this season and will have plenty to say on Wednesday night in Kazan.
Brother vs. brother in Montenegrin derby
There will be more than just a EuroCup win at stake on a history-making Wednesday night for Montenegrin basketball. The Group B clash between Mornar Bar (2-2) and Buducnost (3-1) will be also about prestige and bragging rights. These two teams feature many former teammates; Buducnost point guard Nikola Ivanovic will face the club where he started his professional career, while brothers Suad and Sead Sehovic square off at the wings. Buducnost, the perennial Montenegrin champion and a three-time EuroCup quarterfinalist, has held an upper hand in this rivalry domestically. Buducnost and Mornar have played in the last four Montenegrin League finals and Buducnost won three of those best-of-five encounters. Mornar lifted a historic crown in 2018. Buducnost also beat Mornar in the Montenegrin Cup finals four times in the last five years. Last season, Buducnost won all three head-to-head games, including a 92-83 win in the Montenegrin Cup final. It also swept a pair of Adriatic League games and the last time they played in Bar, it was a double-overtime classic in which Buducnost pulled out a 93-95 win. Expect more drama in the Montenegrin coastal town of Bar on Wednesday.
Homecoming in the Serbian capital
EuroCup newcomer JL Broug en Bresse (1-1) has not played its last two games due to multiple team members testing positive for COVID-19. Bourg will get back to action this week on the road at Partizan NIS Belgrade (2-2), which will be a special occasion for Bourg guard and the team’s top scorer Danilo Andjusic, who returns to his hometown to play against his former team and the one he grew up supporting. The 29-year old Andjusic, who opened the season averaging 20.0 points, 5.0 assists and 4.0 rebounds with an average PIR 27.5, had two stints with Partizan during his career. He first donned his favorite jersey for a season and a half, from 2011 to 2013, which is also when he also made his Turkish Airlines EuroLeague debut. Andjusic returned to Partizan on a short-term contract for the first part of the 2015-16 campaign, but left after a dozen games. Another Bourg player who Partizan will be very familiar with is center Alen Omic, who played for Partizan’s domestic rivals Crvena Zvezda mts Belgrade, Buducnost and Cedevita Olimpija Ljubljana. Partizan’s Nemanja Dangubic and Nemanja Gordic were teammates of Omic at Zvezda and Buducnost, respectively. There will indeed be plenty of familiarities considering this is a first-ever meeting between the two clubs.
Three-point showdowns await
After four rounds, there are nine teams averaging more than 10 triples per game and four of them will go against one another. In Group D, Nanterre 92 (1-3), which averages 10.5 three-pointers per game, will host winless Extra Frutti Bursaspor (0-3), which ranks third with 11.7 threes per contest. In the other such clash, ratiopharm Ulm (1-3) and its 11.3 threes welcome Unicaja Malaga (3-1), which averages 11.0 shots from downtown. Ulm sharpshooter Andreas Obst is making 3.3 triples per game on 52.0% three-point shooting and is an impressive 11 for 18 over the last three games. Not far behind is Unicaja’s Francis Alonso, who is averaging 3.3 three-pointers on 46.4% accuracy for the season.
The top two three-point shooting teams are UNICS, making 12.3 triples on 44.1%, and Bourg, averaging 12.0 threes on 48%. The two of them face opponents that have struggled from long range, in Joventut (7.5 triples on 30.3%) and Partizan (7.3 on 32.9%). Despite Joventut’s downtown struggles, however, that clash also features two top scoring offenses. Joventut ranks second (88 ppg.) and UNICS fifth (86.7 ppg.). Another duel of two high-scoring sides sees AS Monaco (3-1) welcome Lokomotiv Kuban Krasnodar (3-1). Lokomotiv ranks fourth with 87.3 points per game, while Monaco is not far behind in sixth with 86.3. In a season where more than half of the teams score more than 81.0 points per game, we are set to see some high-scoring offenses square against each other.
Milestones and tidbits
Jamar Smith and Alen Omic are former teammates who won a EuroCup title together with Unicaja Malaga in 2017. This week, the two will be on opposite sides in the aforementioned clash between UNICS and Joventut. Each will try to reach – or get very close to – some significant milestones. Smith needs 5 three-pointers made to catch Rafa Martinez, who leads the all-time charts with 223 triples made. Smith also has 1,105 career-points, which is 12th-most in competition history. He is just 33 points shy of entering the company of the top 10 all-time scorers. Meanwhile, Omic has 209 offensive rebounds for his career, which is 4 behind Vladimir Veremeenko for second place on the career charts. Cedevita Olimpija Ljubljana (1-2) and Promitheas Patras (2-2) are set to face off in Group D in which Olimpija will try to do this week just what Promitheas has done a fortnight ago – bounce back after an abysmal offensive performance. Promitheas scored 51 points in Round 2 on the road against Trento, but managed to bounce back and won two in a row since then. It now will go for three in a row as it faces Olimpija, which last week was held to just 51 points, also in a road loss against Trento.
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