It was a weird game, not because of the Chacho Rodriguez beautiful pre-game celebrations. Olimpia lost 83-77 in the end, after going 12-for-16 from three in the first half, a surreal display of hot shooting, but 2-for-15 in the second. “We missed at least seven threes wide-open,” Coach Messina regretted in his post-game comment. More than that, he pointed out to the 9-for-19 at-the-rim shooting. Olimpia stayed below the 40 percent threshold in two-point shooting, while Real Madrid kept hammering the ball inside using its height advantage basically on every inch of the floor. Edy Tavares set the tone early, with seven points in the first period, 3-for-3 from the field, then Real Madrid used a lot size and shooting coming from the perimeter players, especially Mario Hezonja and Dzanan Musa, great at taking advantage of every single mismatch on the court. Gradually in the second half, Real Madrid took control of the game. Olimpia responded and fought to the end, but the line-up was consistently too small or not enough dynamic. Then cold shooting in the second half doomed every chance of a comeback (Olimpia went behind by 14 and came back within five). “After shooting so well in the first half, our defense was poor and we had just a three-point lead,” Messina said.

Olimpia led 50-47 at the half despite its incredible shooting. Naz Mitrou-Long in his EuroLeague debut made three straight threes, then Kevin Pangos had four of them, Gigi Datome added a couple. Olimpia was on fire, hitting on all cylinders. But couldn’t stop Real Madrid inside game. “In the second half, my feeling is that they came out more aggressive – Messina said – and still we kept building wide-open shots that we missed.” The defense was way better, although it couldn’t come out with a solution on Musa’s inside-out game. The offense was not. Messina tried to use Voigtmann alongside Melli to open up the floor and finished the game with Thomas at the four to have even more shooting. Olimpia stille finished with 15-for-31 from three, Kevin Pangos scored 24 points, Mitrou-Long had 11 points and four assists, Devon Hall added seven assists and Nicolò Melli has 12 efficient points, going 5-for-6 from the field.