European Hoops Wrap-Up: Breaking down Ante Zizic’s Euroleague Debut

With the holidays around, it was a short week for European basketball. Only Euroleague played this week, with the Eurocup between rounds, and the FIBA Champions League taking a week off. Euroleague also officially hit the halfway mark of the season, meaning that all 16 teams have played each other once.

Despite that, we have very little idea of who is going to finish where in the final standings. CSKA Moscow sits first in the league at 12-3, and Galatasaray and EA7 Milano are at the bottom at 4-11. But in between, three teams are 10-5; three are 7-8; and three are 6-9. There’s a lot of bunching up of teams at this point, and teams between the seventh and thirteenth spots have struggled to find consistency and establish a true favorite for the eighth seed.

Things are going to be very interesting as we come down to the wire.

Red Star shocks healthy CSKA Moscow

CSKA Moscow has struggled in recent weeks, needing late runs to edge Barcelona and Maccabi Tel Aviv and losing to Fenerbahce at the tail end of last week. Most of this can be explained by a handicapped roster, as Nando De Colo has been out of the lineup with injury, and Milos Teodosic has been in and out of the lineup needing rest. However, CSKA was at near full squad on Thursday, and still got rocked by Crvena Zvezda, 78-67. This game got off on the wrong foot right away, with Red Star jumping out to an 11-0 lead and leading 27-14 after one quarter. CSKA battled back, but couldn’t make any sustained dents in that early deficit.

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Red Star won because of their defense, which has been fantastic as of late. They have the best defensive efficiency in the Adriatic League this year at 93.9 points allowed per 100 possessions, which is 9.7 points ahead of second place Partizan. In Euroleague, they’ve held Maccabi Tel Aviv to 58; Real Madrid to 70 last week; and CSKA’s high-flying offense to just 67. They lead Euroleague in steals, wreaking havoc on opposing passing lanes with their lengthy wings and pesky guards that swarm opposing ball-handlers and deny everything. Charles Jenkins is the only Euroleague player averaging over 2.0 steals per game, and and he’s helped by Stefan Jovic and Spurs draft-and-stash Nemanja Dangubic, who is perhaps the best defender of the bunch. They forced 19 CSKA turnovers in this game, and that was a big reason for their early lead, as bad offense for CSKA led to open transition looks for Red Star:

Red Star can be a terrible place to play because of how loud the arena is. That’s part of why they’re 6-3 at home. But they’re playing some brilliant defense right now, and also employ two of Europe’s most entertaining hot streak players in Marko Simonovic (14 points Thursday) and Marko Guduric. They’re a team who wears you down mentally just as much as they do physically, and that’s why they look like the favorite to grab the No. 8 seed out of a crowded middle class.

Real Madrid and Efes burn everything down

Real Madrid beat Efes 80-78, in a close contest that went right down to the wire. But this was not a good game, by any stretch of the imagination. Efes shot just 38.6 percent from the field. There were only 23 total turnovers, but many of them were of the “mind-numbingly crippling” variety. Efes shot 29 free throws to eight for the Spaniards, and you couldn’t help but feel the officials were terrified of over-correcting for this as the game went on. Anthony Randolph went 1-of-7 from the field and wasn’t even the worst big on his own team, thanks to Gustavo Ayon being the most movable rim-protector on that side of the Atlantic. This game sounded like fun chaos, but was mostly bad chaos.

However, the game wasn’t all bad. Real Madrid was without Sergio Llull once again, and that, of course, meant we got more of the Luka Doncic show. The best NBA prospect in Europe had 17 points, 5 rebounds, and 9 assists, and kept Real’s offense humming despite some poor shooting performances from his teammates. He once again showcased his strengths in the pick-and-roll, routinely putting the athletically challenged Thomas Huertel and Alen Omic in an impossible bind with his slithery playmaking:

Meanwhile for Efes, Cedi Osman had another strong game, hitting a pair of 3s and finishing with 10 points and 4 rebounds. New addition Brandon Paul also had a nice game with 16 points, struggling to finish inside but drawing a ton of contact, earning seven free throw attempts. Paul’s a stronger scoring lead guard than Huertel, and he seemed to have more success on Doncic in this game. It will be interesting to see what his role is moving forward.

Efes has been stronger overall in the month of December, while Madrid has struggled in the last few weeks to compete with Llull in and out of the lineup. This game was a bit of a mess, but overall, the closeness of the contest is an indicator for how each of these teams are trending.

Ante Zizic is not fun to play against

Ante Zizic debuted for Darussafaka on Friday, as the Turkish side got set to play Barcelona. And while Barca won, 81-77, Zizic passed his first test at the Euroleague level. It wasn’t 35 points and 12 rebounds, but with 4 points, 6 rebounds, 2 steals and 2 blocks, Zizic showed that his skills can translate to a higher level.

Zizic was matched up with a fringe NBA-level big man in Joey Dorsey throughout the contest, and he had a good showing in this matchup. He was able to use his length to score his first basket, getting over the shorter Dorsey for a putback despite losing inside position:

Zizic didn’t fair as well against Aleksandar Vezenkov, as the Bulgarian spotting up in the corner was a tough cover for the slower Zizic. But defensively, he did have some success defending in space, especially against some of the more complex actions that he’s going to see at the NBA level:

Here Zizic’s job was pretty simple, as he just had to defend two high screens. But he does a nice job of recognizing the double screen on the first action, and that Dorsey is no threat when he gets the ball off the second screen. Seeing Zizic make reads and move in space defensively is going to be an important part of assessing his NBA chances this spring.

Overall, Zizic looked like he was a pest for Dorsey to have to deal with. He was able to use his relentless motor and huge frame to perform well on the glass, and his finishing ability looks strong against two NBA-level big men in Dorsey and Ante Tomic. This was a good start for Zizic’s Celtics audition, because he did the things the Celtics will ask him to do.

Eurocup Round of 16 preview

The Eurocup Round of 16 kicks back up this week, with the top four squads from each of the regular season groups advancing to the next round. The six-week round will run until the beginning of February, at which point the top eight teams advance to the playoffs. The groups will feature varying levels of competition, with Group H looking wide open, and Group E looking sewn up by the favorites, Gran Canaria, before a game has even been played. Here are the quick predictions for how the groups will shake out.

Group E

1. Gran Canaria
2. UCAM Murcia
3. Lokomotiv Kuban
4. Montakit Fuenlabrada

NBA Prospects to watch: C Anzejs Pasecniks, Gran Canaria; PG Facundo Campazzo, UCAM Murcia; PG Ludde Hakkanson, Fuenlabrada; C Moussa Diagne, Fuenlabrada; SG Kyle Kuric, Gran Canaria

Biggest question mark: Can Lokomotiv Kuban find consistent offensive footing?

Group F

1. Khimki Moscow
2. ratiopharm Ulm
3. Bayern Munich
4. Lietkabelis Panevezys

NBA Prospects to watch: C Ondrej Balvin, Bayern Munich; SG Markel Brown, Khimki; PF Marko Todorovic, Khimki; PG David Kraemer, Ulm

Biggest question mark: Who is better between Bayern and Ulm? Ulm had the better regular season record, but Bayern has the best two players (Maximilian Kleber and Devin Booker).

Group G

1. Zenit St. Petersburg
2. Hapoel Jerusalem
3. Lietuvos Rytas
4. Nizhny Novgorod

NBA Prospects to watch: PF Janis Timma, Zenit; C Arturas Gudaitis, Rytas; PF Aaron White, Zenit; PF Drew Gordon, Rytas; SF Michael Moshkovitz, Hapoel Jerusalem

Biggest question mark: Can Rytas and Hapoel Jerusalem find consistency? Neither played to their potential in the regular season, and if this happens this group could get wild.

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Group H

1. Valencia
2. Unicaja Malaga
3. Cedevita Zagreb
4. Alba Berlin

NBA Prospects to watch: SF Dzanan Musa, Cedevita; PF Bojan Dubljevic, Valencia; SG Nemanja Nedovic, Malaga; C Viny Okouo, Malaga; PF Marko Arapovic, Cedevita

Biggest question mark: Is Nemanja Nedovic healthy? If so, he boosts Malaga to a high enough level that they might win the group.