2006/07 Baltic basketball league (BBL) Official Thread

[LuDux]

Also Zalgiris - Kalev will be TV game (ETV will show it).

Kalev coaches are blaming refs for yesterdays loss

Again??

http://www.eurobasket.com/EST/est.asp?NewsNo=2&NewsType=2

BBL team budgets according to Lietuvos Rytas and BBL director Balciunas mln$/mlnE:
Zalgiris - 4,80 / 3,77
Rytas - 4,42 / 3,48
Ventspils - 1,66 / 1,30
ASK Riga - 1,62 / 1,27
Kalev - 1,22 / 0,96
Rock - 1,22 / 0,96
Barons - 1,14 / 0,90
Siauliai - 0,74 / 0,58
Valmiera - 0,59 / 0,46
Panevezys - 0,37 / 0,29
Neptunas - 0,28 / 0,23
Nevezis - 0,28 / 0,23
Atletas - 0,22 / 0,17
Sakalai - 0,18 / 0,14

[Endym]

Again??

Yes. But Kuusmaa is very emotional. Thats why we all love him.

And Kalev wants to send the video tape of that game to BBL headguarters in Riga. Probably just a overreaction (like the Sakalai coach blaming estonian refs last season)

Lets hope Kalev can give Zalgiris a good fight today (i can hope, can i?). With neutral refs.

Regarding budgets, i don't think Kalev and Rock budget is the same. Kalev is near 15 mil EEK, Rock over 10mil EEK (1USD~13EEK).

[Endym]

Zalgiris - Kalev 74:72

Damn. That was close. But better this than a blowout loss.

[rusher]

Regarding budgets, i don't think Kalev and Rock budget is the same. Kalev is near 15 mil EEK, Rock over 10mil EEK (1USD~13EEK).

And Barons budget is little bit bigger. It's around ASK's numbers.

BTW...budget not always decides the games

Valmiera/LA - Barons/LMT 68:65

Painfull loss for Barons- they were having many mistakes. I don't think team is really ready for the season or they just underrated the opponent. But new Valmiera's arena is really nice and the team looks very interesting so it will be the team to beat for all of the teams.

Games keep comin'

Panevezys - Ventspils 77:83 (29:17, 16:18, 22:24,10:24).

[LuDux]

Regarding budgets, i don't think Kalev and Rock budget is the same. Kalev is near 15 mil EEK, Rock over 10mil EEK (1USD~13EEK).

This tuesday weekly Krepsinis gave same numbers as you, but friday Lietuvos Rytas quoted Balciunas saying its 3,3 mln LLT for both teams.

[rusher]

ASK Riga - Atletas 96:68

Millage 23, Babrauskas 22, Grafs 16, Freimanis 10, Bramlett 9, Mētra 8, Viļums 7, Šēnhofs 1.
Tribe 23, Simonavicus 18, Dabkus 12, Juknevicus 9, Dimavicus 3, Cizikas 3.

No problem at all as expected. I wasn't in Arena but what i'm heard that ASK played with youngsters more so the result could be much bigger. And Valters, Andriukaitis and Vecvagars didn't played because of injuries. If the team could get Andriukaitis and Valters ready for the next game at home vs Rytas ASK could have a chanse to play very competitive game.Nice game from 18 years old Freimanis too. ASK also has other interesting youngsters in their 2nd team that plays in LBL so I hope we'll see 'em too.

TU/Rock - Nevezis 77:71

Nice to see estonians grabbing victories or playing hard with teams like Zalgiris. League will be very good this year I hope.

[sashikas]

Šiauliai - Žalgiris 69:87 (13:27, 20:30, 20:8, 16:22)

After not-so-encouraging opening game of the season against Kalev, Žalgiris managed to win quite easily versus the last year's third-place winners of both BBL and LKL.

Š: Marius Prekevičius 17, Audrius Danusevičius 13, Arvydas Čepulis 10, Aurimas Kieža 9.
Ž: Hanno Mottola 21, Marko Popovič 17 (6 steals, 5 rebs, 4 ass), Paulius Jankūnas 12 (9 rebs), Jonas Mačiulis 9 (6 rebs), Tanoka Beard 9.


Nevėžis - ASK Riga 62:77 (19:27, 13:13, 15:19, 15:18).

N: Mindaugas Sakalauskas 16, Tomas Rinkevičius 13, Andrius Aleksandrovas 11.
ASK: Curtis Millage 16 (4 steals, 6 TOs), Steponas Babrauskas 15 (7 rebs), Ugis Vilums 14.

Neptūnas - Barons 73:82 (21:21, 15:15, 19:24, 18:22).

N: Andrius Petkūnas 14, Michail Anisimov 12, Vitalijus Stanevičius 10, Roland Dorsey 10.
B: Curtis Marshall 16, Armands Škele 15, Maris Gulbis 15, Gediminas Maceina 13, Kaspars Berzinš 13.

Valmiera-Lacplėša alus - Sakalai 89:75 (18:19, 20:25, 29:16, 22:15)

V: Sandis Amolinš 20, Andrejs Jansons 19, Martins Berklis 16.
S: Martynas Gecevičius 14, Aidas Viskontas 12 (5 TOs), Justas Sinica 11.

[Marius123]

ASK Rīga managed to beat visiting Lietuvos Rytas Vilnius 78:77.

I heard S.Babrauskas came to fist fighting with Rytas GM J.Vainauskas - is it true?

[rusher]

ASK Rīga managed to beat visiting Lietuvos Rytas Vilnius 78:77.

I heard S.Babrauskas came to fist fighting with Rytas GM J.Vainauskas - is it true?

I think Vainauskas called that he is a traitor of Lithuanian basketball, this GM also wanted to fight with Millage but Nielsen stopped him
Rytas must improve their game because ASK played with 7 players today and one of them was 18 years old youngster. With Valters, Andriukaitis and Vecvagars who are injured the team should be more stronger. This result isn't logical for me but non the less- ASK deserved the win if they can play that good with 7 players.

[elaj]

I heard S.Babrauskas came to fist fighting with Rytas GM J.Vainauskas - is it true?

[Marius123]

I think Vainauskas called that he is a traitor of Lithuanian basketball, this GM also wanted to fight with Millage but Nielsen stopped him

Vainauskas is a conflict-prone character, while Babrauskas is always ready to smack your teeth if something's wrong. Overall, trying to prove your worth to a club who didn't think you're good enough and sent you travelling on loan - it's only natural.

Why on earth try to fight with some American legionnaire ... OK, whatever, stuff happens.

Rytas must improve their game because ASK played with 7 players today and one of them was 18 years old youngster. With Valters, Andriukaitis and Vecvagars who are injured the team should be more stronger. This result isn't logical for me but non the less- ASK deserved the win if they can play that good with 7 players.

Not easy to make sense of all the results. Panevėžys downs Šiauliai, then loses completely versus Rytas. Who, in their turn, lose to ASK Rīga ...

I didn't follow Latvian teams really closely this off-season ... Is ASK ready to fight Ventspils for the title?

[rusher]

Vainauskas is a conflict-prone character, while Babrauskas is always ready to smack your teeth if something's wrong. Overall, trying to prove your worth to a club who didn't think you're good enough and sent you travelling on loan - it's only natural.

Why on earth try to fight with some American legionnaire ... OK, whatever, stuff happens.

Maybe because he scored decisive 2 points in the last seconds that secured ASK's win.
And I think Babrauskas really wanted to prove that he is a good player today. And he did it.

Not easy to make sense of all the results. Panevėžys downs Šiauliai, then loses completely versus Rytas. Who, in their turn, lose to ASK Rīga ...

Of course I'm not saying that ASK now is some kind of superclub but this result wasn't logical in any meaning of this word. ASK played second game in two days, travelling back to Latvia from Kedainiai, without 3 important players- Andriukaitis, Valters and Vecvagars. They were only with 6 experienced players and 3 youngsters- Freimanis, the best of them- 18 year old played and overall did great job, other two because of the game situation were on the bench all game. Maybe Rytas thought that there'll be no challenge at all in Riga.

I didn't follow Latvian teams really closely this off-season ... Is ASK ready to fight Ventspils for the title?

At first many people thought that they have not so many good players to play with Ventspils for the champion title. But now it seems they have did great job signing foreigners. Millage seems to be one of the best americans who ever played in latvian clubs, Babrauskas and Andriukaitis are two tallanted youngsters that want to prove something and Bramlett has an experience from playing in Spain. If we add NT players Sandis Valters, Raitis Grafs and former NT player Vecvagars + Mētra who played good with Barons last year and Viļums who made a good choise to come and play in ASK instead of sitting on the bench in Ventspils (he wasn't that bad player to sit on the bench for Ventspils) then I think this team is pretty good. And Freimanis- young 18 year old talent also seems to be a nice surprise. He also can play in this league. Šeļakovs and Šēnhofs will be the 11-12th man in roster so I don't think they will have many minutes.
Ventspils started the season not very good but I think they will improve. Overall I think their roster has more experienced players but team that beats Rytas is very serious opponent for them. And if Ventspils would play with ASK now I think ASK would win the game.

[LuDux]

Todays Lietuvos Rytas about conflict between Vainauskas and Babrauskas:

[Zalgirinis]

Hahaha, good quote from Rytas paper. Its very objective and informative

[rusher]

You have great newspapers in Lithuania- our ones are only filled with uninteresting political and economical news.