Flying from Istanbul to Pistoia via Florence, across two time zones and almost three hours of flight. For Olimpia there is no time to complain about the missed opportunity in Istanbul, but only to prepare for the game in Tuscany against a solid team, perhaps not very deep, but endowed with considerable talent as it already demonstrated in Milan, a game they won by coming back from a double-digit deficit in the first half. Olimpia is willing to protect a four-game winning streak in the Italian league. It has also won seven of the last eight games. Over this span, they have only lost on the road, against the league-leading Brescia. This is the ninth game to be played with just one day’s rest after the EuroLeague previous one. Olimpia has won five of these eight contests, three of them on the road. However, it is not going to be a cakewalk. Not even close. “We face one of the revelations of this Italian league, a team with great offensive talent in the open court and one-on-one especially with Willis and Varnado, and point man Charlie Moore,” assistant coach Mario Fioretti said.
Pistoia is in the race for a playoffs’ spot after earning a berth to the Italian Cup Final Eight in Turin. Coached by Nicola Brienza, Pistoia is relying on an immutable rotation of six players led by Charlie Moore, an MVP candidate who is third in points scored (17.5), third in assists (5.6) and first for fouls drawn (6.1 per game) which he then translates by shooting free throws at 86.1 percent clip. Not only that: Moore is shooting 40.9 percent from three on 5.2 attempts per game. His backcourt mate Peyton Willis is a shooting guard who is averaging 16.4 points per game on 41.1 percent shooting on 8.2 attempts per game. He is the fifth-best league scorer. Jordon Varnado, just returning from an injury, is averaging 14.5 points per game on 43.8 percent three-point shooting on 3.6 attempts. “We need to play solid individual and team defense while offensively, since they try to contain, we’ll have to move the ball and play together,” Fioretti added.
Pistoia is also counting on Derek Ogbeide who averages 11.1 points per game with 64.3 percent on twos and is the best rebounder of the league. 2.7 of his 8.2 rebounds are coming from the offensive board. The fifth man in the starting line-up is Ryan Hawkins who is adding 9.3 points and 4.1 rebounds per game and is another stretch shooter who averages 5.4 three-point attempts per game. The sixth man is Carl Wheatle, who’s bringing to the table 7.5 points and 5.1 rebounds over almost 30 minutes on the court.
