european championship U20

[Basketball GOD2]

Oh, I forgot, Butkevicius is the real deal, but he shouldn't be playing C. He should develope his skills for PF/SF position. His shot isn't yet on the level, but with alot of work... but most suitable position for him should be PF.

I think this is because we don't have any legit center. Today Petrukonis started well (only one player who is above 205 cm) with 10 points and 5 rebounds but got 4 fouls in 12 minutes When I saw Butkevicius in second Lithuania baskeball league he played as power foward and even sometimes as small foward. But yeah his shot is broken and he needs a lot of work with it also from what I saw he doesn't have soft touch.

 

[boki2]

If anything pisses me off in european basketball, it's calling fouls on clean blocks. Vidmar had three clean blocks today and all were called as fouls.

 

[Joško Poljak Fan2]

Don't bother putting on your shiny armour, I give up without the fight

Than you admit you could give up even sooner?

Look man, I know the situation could be a lot different if Lithuania had some of their 88' class players as Janavicius or Gecevicius. But this team had neither the offensive power, neither the height (or lack of it in covering Močnik case)... and with such a dominant offensive center as Vidmar is, I don't think anything unusuall at all happened if he get 4-5 achieved fouls in a quarter (as in the 1st quarter), he can do that at higher level and against taller players than at U20...

That along Mlakar and Močnik penetrating almost at will, I think Lithuanian coach can be actually satisfied his team commiting only 30 fouls, not even bothering the criteria.

if it's really the foul issue, you're bothered with...

 

[LuDux2]

Butkevicius is late boomer. 3 years ago magazine "Krepsinis" had top10 most perspective young player lists by year and Butkevicius wasn't even among 5 honorable mentions.

 

[elaj2]

is TV Slo 2 crypted? Just when the game should start, the Channel broke down on my satelitte dish

As I heard they decided in the last minute to code all broadcasts of EC that you can't watch them on satellite (I guess there's something going on with broadcasting rights). I don't know why.

 

[elaj2]

Slovenia - Turkey 82:74
Preldžić 16pts+8rbs, Močnik 12pts+7ast, Klobučar 18pts+4ast, Mlakar 14pts+5rbs+2ast, Vidmar 10pts+7rbs - Yagmur 22pts+6rbs+5ast+11TO , Akis 14pts, Savas 9pts+9rbs



Serbia - Russia 71:65
France - Lithuania 76:71

 

[Arik2]

Today's match against Italy it's a kind of "die or live" game for Israeli U20 NT. I'm really angry that none of many our sports TV channels wants to broadcast our U20 NT and they prefer to show us every whistle of soccer players.

 

[Toxicity2]

Spain and Italy advance to the medal round. Tomorrow game will establish which team finishes 1st in the group F... obviously group E is much tougher and the 2 top teams coming from that group will likely face themselves again in the EC final.

 

[jwfish62]

I am here at the games and spend the entire day in Nova Gorica watching Serbia-Russia, Slovenia-Turker, and Croatia-Bulgaria. The gym is great and everything is very accessible. There were atleast 15-20 NBA scouts walking around and plenty of Euroleague scouts as well. The gym reached standing room only when Slovenia took the floor. The first two games were both great nailbiters. As you can probably already can tell by the stats, here is a breakdown of the top performances I saw today:

Serbia vs Russia
Shved looked very good. He has a great pull up jumper in the lane and elevated tremendously. He is so freakishly long around 6'6 and so skinny. There's no way that he ways more than 170 lbs. Urazmanov and Seergev both played great pressure defense and solid distributing performances, but can't be considered much of prospects. Kashirov was like a tree in the paint on the offensive glass. Hopefully he can see more time in the rest of the tournament and next year with CSKA. The coach did not show much confidence in him however. Sheleketo did not stand out, hitting only a few spot up 3's.

Teodosic looks nothing less of a Pistol Pete/Steve Nash. He is clearly the best guard here and is one of the best distributors around. His perrifial vision is just breathtaking. He had one no look pass to Durkovic in the lane for a dunk immediately followed on the other end by a Labovic block which Teodosic saved from going out of bounds between his legs in the air. The entire Serbia offense is run through him and his passing skills. Labovic showed great footwork in the post with back to the basket spin moves and back downs. His post game is coming along. His shot also looked well. He actually had a few tremendous blocks as well. Dragovic played decent as well as Paunic. Stimac was pretty quiet. Tepic seems to be stuggling with the coach's rotations (obviously favoring the FMP kids). Tepic did not even play the first quarter. How does that happen to your captain?


Slovenia vs Turkey

Preldzic played very good and hit many shots (impressive considering the nack on his shooting touch at the Hoop Summit in Memphis). Very athletic and long. Vidmar definetely looked like the top big man in this game, but had a great battle with Savas. These 2 seem pretty sure fire NBA prospects.

Nothing special for Turkey.

Croatia vs Bulgaria
Very disappointing for Croatia. Tomic looked nice with good footwork and moves and a beautiful jump shot, but his body is a shame. He needs more muscle. He plays so similar to Pau though. Someone needs to take him into weightroom. If he will play in the NBA he must dominate against Bulgaria.

 

[elaj2]

Tomorrow Slovenia needs to win vs. Russia in order to qualify for the semi-finals, or at least lose but less than 4 points. Very difficult mission.

 

[Joško Poljak Fan2]

Slovenia vs Turkey

Preldzic played very good and hit many shots (impressive considering the nack on his shooting touch at the Hoop Summit in Memphis). Very athletic and long. Vidmar definetely looked like the top big man in this game, but had a great battle with Savas. These 2 seem pretty sure fire NBA prospects.

Nothing special for Turkey.

watching the gamescore I had the feeling Vidmar played dissastrous, but watching the replay he wasn't that bad, eventhough he can do much better than that. He blocked two dunk attempts and eventhough he collected only 7 rebounds, his positioning and blocking out were priceless, eventhough Turkey collected big number of offensive rebounds.
The game was fast and physical, and some of those scoring sprees at the faster pace decided the game.
Močnik has troubles getting off screen, but when he got screened by Savas he ussualy couldn't pass by and Yagmur repeatedly used that.

jwfish6, how is Russia's frontcourt?
I just checked up the stats and the best russian rebounder is Vorontshevich with bare 5 rebounds per game, while they managed to over-rebound everyone except Greece in the first game (27-28)

 

[woma2]

In a very interesting game today at Division B tournament Germany defeated Poland 85:68. The game was finished with 34:9 run by Germany team, thanks to their zone defense and efficiency on offensive end. Germany were down by 8 points when 4th quarter started and had Tim Olbrecht with 4 fouls, but then their poin guard Gunther stepped in big time and made 3 huge plays, showing serious leadership skills. Then other players followed him, Olbrecht playing at left side of 2-3 zone stayed without foul for the rest of the game and Nikita Kchartchenkov made some incredible long range shots.

After the first game I was very critical about Olbrecht, but he is looking better and better with every game.

Tomorrow Poland is playing against Montenegro and we need to win by 10 points to advance to semifinals. I don't see it...

Also today, Finland defeated Slovakia 69:67 after buzzer beater 3 pointer by Koivisto. Finland along with Ukraina is already in semifinals, they will play tomorrow for the first spot in their group.

 

[Srle2]

Djurkovic remind me of Zoran Savic. He could make the senior national team in a future. Tough player.

 

[jwfish62]

jwfish6, how is Russia's frontcourt?
I just checked up the stats and the best russian rebounder is Vorontshevich with bare 5 rebounds per game, while they managed to over-rebound everyone except Greece in the first game (27-28)

They are very undersized besides Kashirov. They basically only use Vorontshevich (6'9), Gubanov (6'8 maybe 6'9), Sheleketo (6'8) and Kashirov (7'1). They are all undersized besides Kashirov and none of them are real true post players. Kashirov is legit, but he is the least skilled of them all. Basically, they are a guard oriented team with 3 good guards (Shved, Urazmanov, and Seergev) and a very weak frontcourt. Where is Vasily Zavoreuv? This team with Zavareuv and Korolev would be top 4 favorites with Slovenia and a complete Turkey and Serbia.

Djurkovic remind me of Zoran Savic. He could make the senior national team in a future. Tough player.

He is such a banger and bruiser. He is a little undersized and but he has plenty of room to put on his frame. You should have seen the play where he ran full speed into the metal gate and bounced right up arguing the call. His defense was also very intense along with his smack talk from the opening tip.

 

[Srle2]

Thats why Djurkovic remind me of Zoran Savic. He has way to go. But in the future he might be that type of player.

 

[elaj2]

I watched the game vs. Turkey and I had a feeling if Turkish players had better outside shooting % the game would be even closer.

I guess Slovenia NT will try to push as many balls to the paint as possible in order to win the game vs. Russia.

In my opinion Slovenian guards (Močnik, Klobučar, Mlakar) will have to play their best defensive game of the tournament vs. Russia in order to win the game. Močnik could show more aggressivness on defense, as I remember he didn't have a foul in the game vs. Turkey and he was defending Yagmur. I mean, man he is quick as hell, he should also use his hands...

Alot will depend also on Vidmar and Krušič, I expect them to dominate the paint. They both need to play more aggressive especially on offense. Anyway, I want to see more aggressiveness on the court.

There is no doubt our advantage vs. Russians is in the paint with Vidmar, Krušič and on the SF position with Preldžić who is in my opinion playing overall looking quite bad tournament. I expected more from him.

I guess the game is more team orianted, but still Preldžić is taking too many stupid shoots and clearly he annoys me with that sometimes very inexperienced drives to the basket in the traffic - he is trying to force things. I expect a better performance by Emir today.

 

[critter out on a walk2]

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Judging by statistics, I am truly disappoined by the performance of Turkey's Bora Pacun (8.6 ppg.) and Oner (10.0 ppg.).

This is the fifth time in a row that the Turkish U-16/U-18/U-20s are failing to live up to expectations. Perhaps, it is high time for the coach, Nihat Izic, to call it quits.

 

[Joško Poljak Fan2]

This is the fifth time in a row that the Turkish U-16/U-18/U-20s are failing to live up to expectations. Perhaps, it is high time for the coach, Nihat Izic, to call it quits.

man, watching him i got the feeling he wouldn't stop yelling even if he had Kobe, LeBronze, Wade, Duncan and Garnett in the game
Repeated nervous brake-downs everytime sth. went wrong- Sagadin type coach. But one thing I liked with him was that he is really down on the ground. He didn't argue with the referees, but with players instead, trying to show players that referees are just a neccesary evil, while it's actually up to them to make a result- just a feeling i got yesterday.

 

[Srle2]

Nice win. Stimac exploded today. Tepic woke up. Teodosic with another 10 dishes. Labovic with standard preformance,two games in the row off the bench.

 

[Joško Poljak Fan2]

Russia - Slovenia 33-32

too many uneccesary TO's on both side. I hope Slovenia will finally get rid of their bad periods and play a bit more stable- in that case victory shouldn't be questionable.
5 idiotism's in the first minute and a half was too much.