Interbasket

Day three of Eurobasket 2007 saw several upsets that changed the face of the next round:

Israel 87: Serbia 83 (game thread)
Israel shocked Serbia today behind an excellent performance from Yaniv Green. Israel was the 16th and final team to qualify for EuroBasket.

Coming into the game, many believed that the size of the Serbs (specifically Darko Milicic) would punish the Israeli team in the paint. Enter Yaniv Green, who held down the middle, scored 26 points and pulled in 12 rebounds for Israel, including two free throws that gave Israel the lead for good with under a minute left. Green’s performance was doubly-important as the 6-9 forward was matched-up against his bigger opponent, in both size and name, 7-0 Serbian center Darko Milicic (18 points, 13 rebounds, 4 blocks). Yotam Halperin added 17 points for Israel. Milan Gurovic scored 19 points for Serbia.

Lithuania 84: Germany 80 (game thread)
In a battle of the two unbeatens in group C, Lithuania was able to squeeze out a close-win after almost forfeiting a 21-point lead against Germany. With 11 seconds remaining, Dirk Nowitzki hit two free-throws (after hitting a three the previous possession) to bring Germany within one, but an untimely offensive foul by Ademola Okulaja on Germany’s next possession closed out any chance for Team Germany. Nowitzki put up 28 points and 9 rebounds while Ademola Okulaja had 12 points and 7 rebounds. Darjus Lavrinovic led Lithuania with 18 points, Sarunas Jasikevicius added 15 points, 10 assists and 4 rebounds and Ramunas Siskauskas had 13 points and 6 rebounds.

Portugal 77: Latvia 67 (game thread)
Andris Biedrins scored 14 points, grabbed a tournament-high 18 rebounds and blocked 3 shots for Latvia, but that wasn’t enough to overcome his team’s overall 27% from the field. On the other side, Portugal was an efficient 9-18 from three and 90% (20-22) from the free throw line. Portugal was led by forward Joao Santos who scored 14 points and had 8 rebounds, and Mário-Gil Fernandes had 14 points. For Latvia, Kristaps Janicenoks hit 4-6 from three, 9-10 from the free throw line and scored 22 points, but missed all five of his two-point attempts.

Even with the win, it did not guarantee Portugal a spot into the next round. Croatia would have to defeat Spain for the Portuguese to advance, and if the Spanish beat Croatia, Latvia would move on.

Slovenia 67: France 66 (game thread)
Slovenia continues to surprise, bringing their overall mark to 3-0 with an impressive win over France.

Slovenia led 67-65 with 0.1 seconds left. Tony Parker, the 2007 NBA Finals MVP, went to the free throw line with a chance to tie the game with two free throws, but was only able to convert one. France focused their defense on Jaka Lakovic (Lakovic only got one shot up; he missed), so his backcourt mate Domen Lorbek responded with 15 points (5-5 from the field). Matjaz Smodis added 15 points and 6 rebounds for the Slovenians. Despite missing the crucial free-throw, Tony Parker scored 25 points for Las Bleus and Ronny Turiaf had 13 points, 5 rebounds and 2 blocks.

Russia 61: Greece 53 (game thread)
Greece just couldn’t get their offense going against the Russians today and succumbed from 37% from the field and 58% from the free-throw line. Super Greek backcourt Dmitrios Diamantidis and Theo Papaloukas combined for 16 points, 9 turnovers and just 2 assists. Andrei Kirilenko collected 17 rebounds, 12 points and 5 turnovers for Russia, while JR Holden scored 17 points. V asillis Spanoulis led Greece with 12 points but shot just 3-9 from the field and 4-8 from the free throw line.

Turkey 80: Czech Republic 72 (game thread)
The Turks got their first win over the tired-Czechs. Mehmet Okur and Hidayet Turkoglu led Turkey to a 15-2 start, and the duo finished with 16 points at the end of the first quarter. The Czechs fought back in the next quarter, to come within three, but another 15-0 run expanded the Turkish lead to 46-31 at the half.

CR made a couple more runs in the second half, but wouldn’t be able to overtake Turkey. Lubos Barton scored 22 points for the Cezch Republic. For Turkey, Memo Okur finished with 16 points and 10 rebounds, Turkoglu scored 22 points, had 5 rebounds and 5 turnovers. Ibrahim Kuatluay scored 17 points after being held to zero points yesterday by Germany.

Croatia 85: Spain 84 (game thread)
In a day of upsets, this was probably the biggest one. Marko Tomas hit a three with 3.1 seconds left and Rudy Fernandez couldn’t convert the final shot; lifting the Croatian National Team over the 2006 World Champions Spain.

Spain, had been unbeaten for not only the two games of EuroBasket, but for 28 straight international competitions going back. The win gave the Croatians the top seed coming out of Group B.

Rudy Fernandez had a chance to win the game, but his drive into the heart of the Croatian defense yielded no basket. As the Spanish team complained that Fernandez was fouled on the drive, the Croatians celebrated their win. The three Markos led the Croatian team: Marko Popovic scored 18 points, Marko Banic grabbed 9 rebounds (+12 points), and Marko Tomas passed for 4 assists in addition to hitting the game-winning three. Pau Gasol’s 26 points led the Spanish, Rudy Fernandez added 14 points and 3 steals and Felipe Reyes had 10 points and 10 rebounds. With the win, Croatia will face Israel in the first round, while Spain will face Greece.

Italy 79: Poland 70 (game thread)
The stakes were high- the winner of this game would move on, the loser would go home. Poland finished the first quarter with a 16-14 lead, but Italy would capture the rest of the quarters, behind a strong second that included a 22-6 run. Marco Belinelli led Italy with 20 points and Andrea Bargnani went for 19 points and 7 rebounds. Lucasz Koszarek put up a double-double for the Polish, 10 points and 11 assists. Andrzej Pluta scored 15 points and Adam Wojcik had 12 and 6 rebounds. Massimo Bulleri added 10 points, 8 assists, and 6 rebounds for Team Italy.

With the completion of today’s games Latvia, the Czech Republic, Serbia and Poland have been eliminated from the tournament. The top three teams from the four groups move into two groups of six in the second phase, which starts in Madrid on Friday, September 7th, with the results from the first phase carrying over.

Eurobasket 2007 is upon us. Sixteen European National teams are vying to be the king of Europe and more importantly, for two spots to the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

With Israel winning the final wild card spot on Friday against FYROM, all 16 teams are now set and all will be competing on the first day. Some of the more anticipated matches are Turkey taking on Lithuania, Serbia vs. Russia, and Italy against Slovenia. The first days schedule can be found below:

A/2: Serbia-Russia @ Granada, 18:00
C/1: Czech Republic-Germany @ Palma de Mallorca, 18:00
B/2: Latvia-Croatia @ Sevilla, 19:00
D/1: Poland-France @ Alicante, 19:00
A/1: Greece-Israel @ Granada, 20:30
C/2: Lithuania-Turkey @ Palma de Mallorca, 20:30
B/1: Portugal-Spain @ Sevilla, 21:30
D/2: Italy-Slovenia @ Alicante, 21:30

Eurobasket is the last regional championship and will determine which two European teams will go to the 2008 Olympics. It is also expected to be the most competitive of all the regional championships with up to ten contenders.

Spain, the 2006 World Champions and hosts of EuroBasket are the early favorites for just those reasons; they have home court and are expected to have all their main players that helped them to the gold medal in 2006 - Pau Gasol, Jose Calderon, Juan Carlos Navarro, Rudy Fernandez, Jorge Garbajosa, Carlos Jimenez, Alex Mumbru, Marc Gasol and Sergio Rodriguez

However, one cannot discount the 2006 World Championships silver medalists Greece, who will also bring back the majority of their core team: Theodoros Papaloukas, Dimitris Diamantidis, Nikos Zissis, Lazaros Papadopoulos, and Vassilis Spanoulis (Antonis Fotsis is injured and Sofoklis Schortsianitis was kept off the team as he was reportedly way above his playing weight).

Nor should anyone count out Lithuania who will have Sarunas Jasikevičius back running the show along with one of Europe’s best forwards in Ramūnas Siskauskas, and the inside muscle of Darius Songaila (Washington Wizards), Robertas Javtokas, and Linas Kleiza (Denver Nuggets).

France is looking to improve upon their previous performances, “It’s two straight third-place finishes at the Euros and now it’s time to make that final step,” said Tony Parker. In addition to Parker, France boasts three other NBA Players - Boris Diaw, Yakhouba Diawara, and Ronny Turiaf.

Turkey welcomes NBA All-star Mehmet Okur and Hidayet Turkoglu back on the Turkish National team. They will join a very talented squad that includes promising young prospects Cenk Akyol and Ersan Ilyasova, veteran shooter Ibrahim Kutluay, center Kaya Peker, and guard Engin Atsür of North Carolina State University.

Other countries expected to make some serious noise are Italy, Russia, Slovenia and when it comes to international tournaments, any team that has Dirk Nowitzki on their roster is always considered a threat.

Eurobasket starts out with four groups (A-D) each with four teams who will play each other once. Then the top three teams from each group advance to two six-team qualifying-round. The top eight teams (four from each group) will advance to the quarterfinals. Madrid will host the final on Sept. 16.

[Eurobasket 2007 forum] [official site]