The third EuroLeague game of the season at the Mediolanum Forum has already become an important one for Olimpia, an opportunity to establish a team identity identity after two games of big productions and no win, due to the unexpected defensive collapse of a team that only the previous week had held Olympiacos to 53 points in a whole game. The test is very tough because Monaco is a team with a clear offensive mindset: Mike James needs no introduction because he is a player who has just surpassed 4,000 points scored for his career, the fourth in history to reach this milestone. Mike James is the second-best scorer of this EuroLeague season, behind Nikola Mirotic, who, up to this point, has scored at least twenty points in four out of five games. The top two scorers of the competition therefore compete against each other, but Monaco doesn’t have James only as potent bucket getter: Elie Okobo, the returning Jordan Loyd, are all players with unquestioned offensive potential, as is Kemba Walker, the former NBA All-Star who is recovering his best condition. He hasn’t shown his enormous potential yet, but obviously the talent is all there. In the two games mentioned, Olimpia had a lot, as well as from Mirotic, from Shavon Shields, who also had two games over twenty points, is averaging 17.0 points per game on 46.2 percent shooting from three, the best figure of his career. He is the fifth-best scorer of the competition. It is no coincidence that Olimpia did enough offensively to win his games. Against Maccabi, the team scored 32 points in the first quarter with 5-for-5 from three-point territory. The defense must step up, that’s for sure. Maccabi looked unstoppable in the paint, as Alba Berlin looked in the final minutes of that game. Monaco has one of the most athletic centers in Donta Hall, has depth with Hall, Motiejunas and Mom Jaiteh, as well as the contagious energy of John Brown. It will be necessary to find cohesion again to get back on the right path. Tip-off time on Thrusday, November 2, will be at 20:30.
REFEREES – Juan Carlos Garcia (Spain), Rain Peerandi (Estonia), Mario Majkic (Croatia).
COACH ETTORE MESSINA – “We are coming off three mediocre games in a row, including the Italian league one, so we need to earn our fans trust back, by playing with courage, determination, team spirit, trait that have been historically part of this club’s DNA and this particular team has to promptly recapture.”
AS MONACO OUTLOOK – AS Monaco, after reaching the 2023 Final Four, losing the semi-final against Olympiacos, kept the coach Sasa Obradovic and a large part of the team that reached that goal and won the French title, namely: the scoring point guard Mike James (18.8 points and 6.6 assists per game, 42.4 percent from three), the French guard with an NBA background, Elie Okobo (10.4 points per game, 52.6 percent from three), the American guard Jordan Loyd who should make his debut in Milan after being injured for a while, the French forward Alpha Diallo (10.0 points and 4.2 rebounds per game), the American swingman Jaron Blossomgame (4.8 points and 3.2 rebounds per game) plus the power forward John Brown (7.6 points per game, 66.7 percent from two) and centers Donatas Motiejunas (6.4 points per game) and Donta Hall (4.6 points and 3.4 rebounds per game). The newcomers are point-guard Kemba Walker (5.7 points per game), a four-time All-Star in the NBA; guard Terry Tarper, a French international with great defensive reputation; the center Mom Jaiteh, who had played for Virtus Bologna in the previous two seasons; and power forward Petr Cornelie (4.2 points per game, 50.0 percent three-point shooting) who was at Real Madrid last year. Also returning are point guard Matthew Strazel (4.3 points per game) and guard Yakouba Ouattara, a deadly shooter averaging 6.5 points in 14.4 minutes on the court.
SERIES HISTORY – The two teams split the two games played during the last two seasons. Olimpia won in Monaco and Monaco won in Milan in the return game during the 2021/22 season. On the other hand, they both won at home during the 2022/23 season. Olimpia won the Milan game 77-71 coming back from a 17-point deficit in the second half to win.
THE MONACO CONNECTION – Mike James has spent one season in Milano, in 2018/19, and was the EuroLeague leading scorer. He appeared in 30 games with 595 points and 191 assists.
KYLE HINES NOTES – Kyle Hines has played 115 EuroLeague games for Olimpia so far, tying Vlado Micov for the third-place ever. Finally, he is nine away from reaching 1,000 defensive rebounds for his career, a milestone surpassed by only six players so far, the last of which was Nicolò Melli. Meanwhile, he became the first ever for games played in the EuroLeague and with 396 is four appearances away from 400 in his career.
NICOLO’ MELLI NOTES – Nicolò Melli is five appearances away from reaching Kaleb Tarczewski’s 156 as the All-Time leader for games played in the EuroLeague with Olimpia. Meanwhile, he has put Ante Tomic behind him as the sole holder of fifth place All-Time in the defensive rebounds ist. The fourth place belongs to Georgios Printezis with 1,065, 38 rebounds ahead of the Olimpia captain.
NIKOLA MIROTIC NOTES – Mirotic’s 38 rating in Istanbul was the third performance ever by an Olimpia player; Berlin’s 36 rating was the sixth highest ever. Mirotic’s career high of 39 dates back to the Round 14 of the 2021/22 season when he played for Barcelona against Real Madrid. In that game he also set his career-high for points scored with 31. He went very close to in Berlin where he scored 30.
NIKOLA MIROTIC NOTES 2 – The performance in Berlin was the 54th game of at least 30 points by an Olimpia player in the history of the first European club competition. The club record is 43 shared by Bob McAdoo and Paolo Vittori. In the EuroLeague era, it was the eighth game with at least 30 points scored by an Olimpia player. The overall record belongs to Samardo Samuels with 36.
SHAVON SHIELDS NOTES – Shields surpassed 1,500 career points scored in Berlin. 976 are those have been scored for Olimpia, the 4th-best ever. The only three players who have scored more than 1,000 points in the top European competition are Bob McAdoo, Vlado Micov and Sergio Rodriguez. His 22 points against Maccabi are his 13th “Over 20” game in the EuroLeague. Seven were produced for Olimpia. The record is 34 (2020/21 against Bayern Munich); twice he scored 26 points (against Khimki in Moscow in 2020/21; against Olympiacos in Milan in 2021/22).
