Real Madrid's dominance continues, beating Olympiacos to make their second straight EuroLeague Final

Well, this one was decided pretty quickly, about as quickly as a game of this magnitude can be decided really. We stressed in our Final Four preview the importance of Olympiacos keeping this game close in the early stages by shutting off transition opportunities and making the pace of the game a glacial one. If Real got out to an early lead, it would always be tough for Olympiacos to battle back. 

Los Blancos had built a double-digit lead of 19-8 thanks to a Dzanan Musa 3 with just under four minutes to go. From there, it was the Edy Tavares show. The Cape Verdean dominated as a roll man. Olympiacos went away from their standard switch defense and played drop coverage but Facundo Campazzo and others did a brilliant job of drawing Moustapha Fall and other Olympiacos centers up high to open up the lob pass. Tavares was able to catch and finish without dribbling, or drawing multiple corner help defenders and dish out for open 3s. Olympiacos' head coach Georgios Bartzokas talked about their pick-and-roll defense with FanSided at the post-game press conference.

“Listen, during the year we have 2 or 3 different type of defenses in pick and roll,” Bartzokas said. “One is to play flat or low flat, one switching defense you know based on the characteristics of our big men the thing is for Real Madrid they have really good pick-and-roll users. We changed on the switching defense in the second quarter but we missed the defensive rebounds. We came back playing flat defense and we were more effective in this kind of defense.”

Back-to-back 3-pointers from Guerschon Yabusele extended Real Madrid’s lead to 28-10 with less than 30 seconds to go. Olympiacos offense was at a standstill, Real brought an intensity at the end of the floor that we hadn’t seen from them this season, which is saying something. A forced shot clock violation and a block from Fabian Causeur on Nigel Williams-Goss on the final play of the first quarter brought WWE-style celebrations out of Real Madrid head coach Chus Mateo. 

“Olympiacos we knew were gonna try roughness,” Mateo told FanSided. “This is the reason we wanted to run. When you don’t control the rebound it’s not so easy to run. When you are receiving baskets and you are not defending so well it’s not so easy to run. So anything starts from a good defense.” 

“For me, it’s easy to manage this kind of team because all of them are fighting together, and are great players. I am very proud of them,” he added.

Olympiacos offense bounced back in the second quarter, dropping 27 points, but only to be outdone by Real Madrid’s 28. Sergio Rodriguez continued to defeat Father Time and linked up with Vincent Poirier with two alley-oop dunks that, while still being highlight reel plays, have become the norm for the two of them. It’s like the Showtime Lakers but in Madrid. 

“We’ve grown together, I just need to find him. He knows when his big is ahead of him and then he knows where to go,” Rodriguez told FanSided after the game.

“This is something we’ve worked on from the beginning of the season and last year,” Poirier said when talking to FanSided after the game. “We have great chemistry. He knows the move I’m gonna make and confident he’ll make the right choice of whether or not to send me the ball and I try my best to finish strong.”

Thanks to a Shaquille McKissick buzzer-beater 3 to end the quarter Olympiacos went into the half trailing 56-37. They came out of the break with new life, and their five-man group of Thomas Walkup, Williams-Goss, Kostas Papanikolaou, Alec Peters, and Moustapha Fall helped them battle back into the game. They created good looks from three off Walkup pick-and-rolls turned dribble handoffs and strung together a series of stops at the other end. 

Their ramped-up physicality and more aggressive deny and help defense trapped Real Madrid. Instead of keeping the ball moving and finding the open man like they did in the first half, many of Real’s stars took the bait and would stop the ball, and pursue isolation basketball. They had the talent to score out of these scenarios — Musa, Hezonja, and Llull hit some tough shots that kept the lead at double-digits, 71-58, heading into the final period. 

Los Blancos had some moments when they sweated. Olympiacos got it down to eight with less than six minutes remaining but Real’s veteran resolve showed out. They got stops, got to the foul line, and a Rodriguez mid-range pull-up with under four minutes to go put them up 12 and the game to bed. Panathinaikos awaits them in the Final in what will hopefully give us the first close game of the weekend.