Partizan, an opponent with whom Olimpia shares many memories, represents an opportunity to get back on track. In a season of ups and downs, a poor week followed the explosion of early January when Olimpia won in Athens despite a short-handed roster and then beat Efes at Palalido, emerging in the fourth quarter that has often proved fatal recently. Partizan began this season with high ambitions, validated by the Belgrade win over Olimpia, then faced some setbacks, serious injuries, and the trauma of Coach Zeljko Obradovic’s departure. The historical coach was replaced by Joan Penarroya, who had started the season with Barcelona. During the last week, Partizan has regained some confidence: they beat Bayern Munich on the road, then overcame a double-digit deficit and beat Hapoel at home to round out the week with a win in the Adriatic League. This means Olimpia will face a healthy opponent, with an high-level of confidence. The absences allowed Arijan Lakic to shine, with 15 points and eight rebounds against Hapoel. Milan, averaging five points per game more than Partizan, needs to extend high-performing time. Against Red Star Belgrade and Zalgiris, Olimpia dominated the game, executing the game plan well, but not in the final, crucial quarter. While Stefano Tonut, Nate Sestina and Ousmane Diop will stay out, Nico Mannion has to be added to the list of unavailable players because of a back injury that occurred at the end of the last Italian league game. Armoni Brooks, who twisted his ankle during the last practice, will be evaluated tomorrow in the morning.

NOTES – Olimpia Milano- Partizan Belgrado is going to be played in January, 29th, at 20:30 in Allianz Cloud, Milan.

THE REFEREES – Robert Lottermoser (Germany), Saulius Racys (Sweden), Marcin Kowalski (Poland).

COACH PEPPE POETA– “We’re facing a team that’s in excellent shape, having won its last two EuroLeague games, and is completely different from the one we faced in Belgrade, having changed coaches and many players. We’ll have to be ready to play a physical game because they have the ability to go big, with Isaac Bonga at the 3 spot. Lately, the physicality and the ability of their point guards, Payne and Calathes, to create a lot for everybody, have been the keys to their wins. We’re coming off a rough week, but that’s precisely why we want to bounce back. To do that, we’ll have to be physical and intense for 40 minutes.”

ZACH LEDAY– “The EuroLeague is the highest level you can find in Europe, and sometimes just winning games isn’t enough; you have to do it twice or three times. We’re coming off two games where we were excellent for 35 minutes, and it wasn’t enough. The lesson we learned is that we have to be excellent for 40 minutes, helping each other on both offense and defense against a Partizan team that’s having a good run, is confident, and will come here prepared.”

PARTIZAN OUTLOOK – After the injury that occurred to point-man Carik Jones (11.4 points and 5.2 assists per game), who looks almost ready to return, Partizan brought to Europe right from the NBA (477 appearances) Cameron Payne (11.3 points and 3.6 assists per game), a creative point guard who is a talented scored (38.5 percent on threes, so far). Another addition was the legendary Nick Calathes (3.8 points and 3.5 assists per game this season), who has played 388 EuroLeague games with 5.7 assists per outing. Shooting guard Duane Washington, who missed the last thee games because of a back injury, in his second season in Belgrade is showing all of his scoring talent (15.0 points per game, 39.2 percent on threes) that he demonstrated during his 79 NBA games he had (9.1 points per game). Sterling Brown, in his second Partizan season, who previously played in the EuroLeague with Alba Berlin, can play both as a guard and as a small forward and is producing 13.5 points per game on 38.8 percent three-point shooting. He is a powerful player who five times had twenty or more points just to confirm his explosive offensive skills. At this position, Partizan has lost Shake Milton (6.7 points per game in his 13 appearances), another NBA veteran. To round out the rotation, 20-year old Mitar Bosnjakovic could be used. At the small forward spot there is the German international, Isaac Bonga (who spent four seasons in the NBA with 143 games played), a player with impressive physical skills who can play at the power forward position too. As of now, he averages 9.2 points and 5.7 rebounds per game, shooting 59.4 percent on twos. The other small forward is supposed to be Vanja Marinkovic (5.9 points and 1.6 rebounds on average) but he got injured lately. So at that spot playing time might be available again for Arijan Lakic, who had a monster game against Hapoel Tel Aviv, last week. The power forward is the American Dylan Osetkowski (5.9 points and 2.4 rebounds per game), a player full of energy who can be spelled by Bonga or Aleksej Pokusevski (3.2 points and 1.7 rebounds on average). Jabari Parker (7.7 points per game) is still part of the roster but was not used lately. The centers are Bruno Fernando (7.7 points and 4.1 rebounds per game) coming from Real Madrid (he is shooting 62.2 percent from two), and Tonye Jekiri, a 32-year old veteran who came to Partizan four games ago (6.0 points per outing) who is a dangerous offensive rebounder (3.5 per game, the same number of defensive rebounds he gets). The Finnish leaper Mikka Muurinen is part of the roster too, but he has not been used extensively so far.

THE PARTIZAN CONNECTION – Zach LeDay spent three years with Partizan after spending one season in Milan in 2020/21. At Partizan, he played in both the Eurocup and the EuroLeague. In the latter competition, he played 68 games for black and white team.

GAME NOTES – Armoni Brooks has made at least 1 three-point shot in 15 straight games. He ranks third in three-pointers made with 2.9 per game and eighth in three-point accuracy at 45.5 percent. Josh Nebo ranks seventh in two-point accuracy at 75.0 percent. Zach LeDay needs 33 points to reach 2,500 for his career. Devin Booker needs 16 points to reach 2,000 for his career. Shavon Shields, after the Zalgiris game, has Olimpia 21 games with 20+ points. In the Partizan game, Pippo Ricci will appear in the EuroLeague game number 144 with Olimpia, tying Kyle Hines at the 4th place all-time behind Nicolò Melli, Kaleb Tarczewski, Shavon Shields. Shavon Shields is 30 points shy of 2.000 with Olimpia in the EuroLeague. Marko Guduric has made 29 consecutive free throws.