48 hours after the rough Game 1 battle, Olimpia faces Bayern Munich in the second game of the EuroLeague playoffs (20:45 tip-off time). Olimpia leads the series 1-0, but the first game was very close, difficult, and won at the buzzer thanks to Malcolm Delaney’s alley-oop pass for Zach LeDay. The latter was the most used player on the court, over 33 minutes including all the 20 minutes of the second half. Olimpia had four men in double figures in a Game 1 that proved to be tough. Olimpia shot better than Bayern from two-point range, but much worse from three-point distance (24 percent vs 42 percent), and managed to prevail in the rebounding battle, 38 -37. Olimpia had five turnovers in the first quarter alone, but it finished with eight turnovers in a game in which no team wasted anything (only eight turnovers for Bayern too).
THE HISTORY OF THE GAME 1 – With a 26-11 second quarter, Bayern took a commanding 19-point lead, 40-21. Olimpia gradually recovered, were down 17 at half-time, then changed pace in the second half, returned to eight points down in the third, but then Bayern responded with three free throws made by Vladimir Lucic and the superb shooting of DJ Seeley (23 points, 5/5 from three). With a 6-0 run, Bayern built another 14-point momentary lead. Sergio Rodriguez’s second half was, however, outstanding. He scored 13 points in the half. The first attempt to take the lead in the fourth with a Kevin Punter three was unsuccessful, but with 1:17 left, Hines rebound puts LeDay in a position to tie the game. After two misses by James Gist from the line, Sergio Rodriguez made his third triple and Olimpia suddenly led by three. Bayern came back within one with two free throws made by Baldwin and with more by Gist retook the lead. With 1.2 seconds left, Delaney’s throw-in generates Zach LeDay’s 79-78 winning shot.
NOTES – Kevin Punter has had a steal in nine consecutive games. Vlado Micov after having exceeded 700 rebounds in his career and is now four rebounds shy of 300 with Olimpia. Sergio Rodriguez is 14 assists away from 1,400 for his career, seven from 300 with Olimpia, and 15 threes away from 500. Zach LeDay has a streak of 15 free throws made, his 9-for-9 of Game 1 is his second performance from the line after the 12-for-12 outing in Milan with CSKA Moscow. Ettore Messina is 25-12 in his career (EuroLeague era) in playoff games.
THE REFEREES – Sasa Pukl (Slovenia), Olegs Latisevs (Latvia), Emin Mogulkoc (Turkey).
COACH ETTORE MESSINA – “Both teams will go out there with great focus, since we know that every playoff game is a new story. For us, it’s necessary to get back our energy, physically and mentally, because we spent a lot of them last night, and improve throughout the series. In order to win Game 2 we’ll need to improve, starting with defense and ball movement.”
MALCOLM DELANEY – “Tomorrow we have to carry the momentum and energy we played with in the second half of the last game. We didn’t make many shots, but we need to continue to build on defense and treat game two like the series is 0-0”.
