European Hoops Wrap-Up: Recapping Europe’s marquee week

Another double-game week in Euroleague coincided with a pivotal day of Eurocup action and the final week of regular season play for the FIBA Champions League. That, combined with the draw for the FIBA Champions League playoffs on Friday, made this perhaps the most action-packed week of European play we’ve seen this year. Several games turned into appointment viewing, either through the stakes they carried or the performances contained within.

With so much to cover, we will deviate from our usual weekly format and try to touch on as many games as we can.

Tuesday

We start in the FIBA Champions League, where Avtodor Saratov — fresh off beating down second place squad Reyer Venezia — secured their place in the next round with an 85-81 win over group leader Le Mans. Nick Minnerath was once again the star of the show, hitting 3-of-5 from 3-point range and finishing with 28/7/3 as he continues to find his shot after a season-long slump. The former D-League All-Star tandem of Minnerath and Vince Hunter continues to round into form, and Avtodor is going to be a difficult out in the next round. For Le Mans, they already had the top spot sealed up, but did get Nuggets draft-and-stash Petr Cornelie’s best FIBA game of the year with 12 points, nine rebounds and two blocks.

Also securing advancement: Maccabi Rishon, who edged Khimik by nine points, and PAOK, who destroyed fellow playoff advancer Ventspils 84-54 in Latvia. We also bid adieu to Finnish upstart Kataja Basket, who were edged by Karsiyaka.

Read More: Roy Hibbert is not finished yet

Tuesday’s lone Eurocup game saw Hapoel Jerusalem seize control of Group C with a 97-81 win over Zenit St. Petersburg. Amar’e Stoudemire was dominant once again, posting 26 points and nine rebounds to pace the Israeli side. In addition to his usual work from the post and pick-and-roll, Amar’e even sank a couple of deep 3s in the middle of the 2nd quarter, pushing a small Hapoel lead to an eight-point margin to set the tone for the rest of the game.

Anthony Bennett made his debut for Fenerbahce in an 86-81 win over Unics Kazan. It was a relatively innocuous start for him — seven minutes, two shot attempts and a steal/assist combo that, while impressive, also featured peak Bennett athleticism.

Jon Diebler shot 6-of-7 from the perimeter, Tibor Pleiss and Alex Tyus shot 17-of-22 from the paint and Galatasaray, previously the worst club in Euroleague, beat Maccabi Tel Aviv by 39 points. Is this rock bottom for Maccabi? Well, we thought that a few rock bottoms ago. They still have to go to CSKA Moscow and Fenerbahce. Who knows what could come next!

Speaking of CSKA, they rested Milos Teodosic against Zalgiris and that bit them, as the Lithuanians used a wild fourth quarter comeback to pick up the upset, 79-74. Former Gonzaga point guard Kevin Pangos led the charge, scoring seven of his 21 points in the final minutes, and adding two assists and two steals. He consistently made CSKA pay off-ball for most of the game, showcasing why he’s a 41.1 percent 3-point shooter, and he switched to some clutch on-ball creation when the team needed it most.

Wednesday

Eurocup action started with Alexey Shved dominating for the second week in a row. Shved went supernova from the perimeter, hitting 8-of-13 for 32 points to go with four rebounds and eight assists in an 85-84 win over Ratiopharm Ulm. This game was never particularly close until late in the final frame, as Ulm needed a furious comeback when Khimki thought they had the game decided. For 3.5 quarters, Shved held court 22.25 feet from the rim.

Meanwhile, Eurocup’s two most chaotic teams gave us a surprising result, as Lietuvos Rytas stayed alive by thrashing Nizhny Novgorod 99-73. Former Delaware 87ers forward Drew Gordon had a strong game with 18 points, 10 rebounds and three assists, once again providing an athleticism advantage inside that Nizhny couldn’t handle. He’s averaging 12.8 points and 9.5 rebounds per game for the season now, and quietly is having an excellent season that shows he could be a potential NBA talent.

In FIBA Champions League play, we waived farewell to Mega Leks, whose bevy of NBA-level youngsters couldn’t hang in the competitions toughest group. And even though they were beaten soundly by Tenerife, 98-73, we got a last hurrah from three solid players. 2017 Draft prospect Alpha Kaba led the way with 13 points and 16 rebounds. Grizzlies draft-and-stash Rade Zagorac had 16 points and seven boards, grabbing five offensive rebounds and showing off his positional versatility. And point guard Ognjen Jaramaz delivered eight assists, continually finding open shooters around the perimeter. Of course young guys make mistakes, but Mega Leks has a bunch of NBA Draft talent and we’ll miss them in this competition moving forward.

In happier news, Strasbourg and Frank Ntilikina are still with us, having beaten Mornar 83-70. Ntilikina was quiet offensively in this game, posting just four points, three rebounds and three assists in 20 minutes. But he’s gotten a regular spot in the rotation over the past few weeks, and that means good things for scouts who will be paying more attention to the probable top-10 pick as the competition gets tougher. Here’s hoping he keeps doing stuff like this every week.

Two more teams punched tickets to the playoffs in the Champions League on Wednesday. Dinamo Sassari upset Partizan at home to earn their spot, knocking down 16 3-pointers in the process. Meanwhile, Fraport Skyliners surprised many by beating Ironi Nahariya to lock down one of the final playoff spots. Both are interesting for different reasons. Sassari is a former Euroleague team that rounded into form in the last couple of weeks after struggling to stay afloat. And while he didn’t play Wednesday, anticipation is high whenever you see 16-year-old Isaac Bonga suited up with Fraport’s varsity team.

Darussafaka lost to Efes in Euroleague, falling 93-81 despite what was perhaps Ante Zizic’s best game as a pro. While he’s had higher statistical outputs this year, Zizic ate Bryant Dunston alive in the paint, posting 16 points and 18 boards in 34 minutes. Much of Dacka’s offense sputtered, but Zizic and Bradley Wanamaker made sweet pick-and-roll music at the top of the key, consistently attacking Efes where they are weakest — the Dunston/Thomas Huertel PNR defense.

Zizic was his usual high-energy self — scoring off put-backs, sealing Dunston on box-outs on both ends and drawing a few fouls off post-ups. But the biggest development from this game was that Zizic was able to show off a little bit of a finesse game, with some English on several finishes and this insane first step blow-by of Dunston:

If Zizic can do THAT at the NBA level? Celtics fans should be salivating constantly.

Thursday

Panathinaikos lost to Crvena Zvezda in Belgrade, 72-66. The game was a microcosm of the past few weeks for both teams. For PAO, a continued offensive stagnation plagued them once again, as they only shot 40.3 percent from the field as a team. The Greens keep running into a strange problem — they rely heavily on two or three guys to carry the scoring load, and get almost nothing from the rest of the roster. Case in point: Kenny Gabriel, Mike James and K.C. Rivers combined for 54 points, and the other nine players that saw time combined for 12.

For Crvena Zvezda, the defense and home-court advantage that have carried them since 2017 started came around again, as Zvezda forced six steals and and hounded Nick Calathes constantly, and denied the rim while attacking it nonstop at the other end. Red Star has won seven straight and now is in 5th in Euroleague; Panathinaikos sits two games from being out of the playoffs entirely. This game showed why both of those things are true.

Galatasaray took all of that good feeling from wiping Maccabi out of the standings…and blew a 13-point lead at Fenerbahce in the Istanbul derby. Jan Vesely had 20 points and seven rebounds in the win, but this is really just an excuse to show how he demoralized Galatasaray during the comeback with one of the most disrespectful dunks of the season.

Friday

Baskonia knocked off Barcelona in the other big Spanish rivalry. This wasn’t much of a game at any point, as Baskonia controlled by hitting 12 3s and dictating the offensive pace, which Barca always struggles with. But it did give us a look at extended minutes for Bulgarian draft prospect Aleksandar Vezenkov, who played well, posting 14 points and five rebounds. Vezenkov held his own defensively and hit both of his 3-pointers, showing off his silky lefty form coming off screens.

Next: 2017 NBA Draft Big Board v2.5

But Vezenkov wasn’t the real story among draft prospects, because once again, Luka Doncic stole the show. With Rudy Fernandez sidelined, Doncic took control of Real Madrid’s win over EA7 Milano, posting 17 points on 5-of-6 shooting with three rebounds and two blocks. Doncic is an absolute treat to watch in the pick-and-roll, and this week’s specialty was a Harden-esque dribble adventure through a triple-team, guest-starring Othello Hunter:

There was also this:

The Superman exists, and he is Slovenian.