It’s the last game of the EuroLeague season in Milan. Olimpia faces Bayern Munich, who, after sliding to the bottom of the standings, bounced back and won in Bologna last Tuesday. It’s not an important game for the result itself but for the prestige. In fact, it marks essentially the start of preparation for the Italian league playoffs, even before wrapping things up in Athens next week. Olimpia, who returned from Valencia last night, played a carbon copy of many other games in Spain: it played well, dominated at times, executing their plan both offensively and defensively, but it faltered when it was time to close the game off, and as has happened several times, when it struggled, Olimpia was unable to overcome the difficulties. The game against Bayern serves to bid farewell at home to the competition in the best possible way and begin to improve ahead of the final part of the season. An attractive element will be the presence on the court of two of the most effective shooters in the competition: Armoni Brooks has hit 97 three-pointers in 36 games played, the German Andreas Obst has hit 95. They are second and fourth overall in the ranking, behind Tyler Dorsey (98, Sylvain Francisco is third with 96).
NOTE – Olimpia Milano-Bayern will be played on April, 9th, at 20:30 in Unipol Forum.
REFEREES – Carlos Peruga (Spain), Gytis Vilius (Lithuania), Rain Peerandi (Estonia).
COACH PEPPE POETA– “The game against Bayern is our last EuroLeague game in front of our home crowd: we’ll do everything we can to play a good game and honor the competition as we have always done so far. We’ll try to do the same in the two games left to play.”
BAYERN OUTLOOK – Since the Munich game, Bayern has changed coach, with Gordon Hebert replaced by Svetislav Pesic. They’ve also struggled to cope with some injuries, such as that of Kamar Baldwin, while the signing of Spencer Dinwiddie proved to be a short-lived move. The point guards are Neno Dimitrijevic, Stefan Jovic, and Justus Hollatz. Dimitrijevic, who arrived during the season, is averaging 10.4 points per game on 40.0 percent three-point shooting and 3.9 assists (he had 10 in Bologna). Jovic (5.3 points and 4.3 assists per game) is a selfless point guard and a very experienced defender but it wont be able to play in Milan. Hollatz, a German international who also played for Efes, is averaging 3.1 points per game but is shooting 43.9 percemt from three. The scoring guard is obviously Andreas Obst, one of the best pure shooters in the entire Euroleague, the team’s leading scorer (14.8 points per game) and the player most used by Pesic (over 26 minutes on average). He’s shooting 37.5 percent from three on 251 attempts. Another excellent shooter is Justinian Jessup, who played for Ulm last year, who is averaging 8.4 points per game on 65.2 percent shooting from two and 37.6 percent from three. Another guard is Xavier Rathan-Mayes, formerly of Real Madrid, a physical player with good ball-handling, averaging 7.4 points per game this season. Vladimir Lucic, a longtime Bayern player, has started 31 times at small forward and is averaging 8.4 points and 3.9 rebounds per game, shooting 57.0 percent from two and 34.7 percent from three. Niels Giffey, another veteran of the team, is adding 4.7 points per game. Power forward Oscar Da Silva, a former Barcelona player, is in his second year at Bayern: he’s averaging 6.1 points per game on 63.6 percent shooting from two. Da Silva also averages 3.6 rebounds per game. Another effective forward is Isiaha Mike, a defensive specialist who played at Bourg and Partizan, as well as for the Canadian national team. He’s currently averaging 9.2 points and 4.0 rebounds per game, shooting 40.2 percent from three. Center Wenyen Gabriel, a South Sudanese national, is a vertical, shot-blocker, averaging 5.9 points and 3.7 rebounds, including 1.8 offensive rebounds per game. David McCormack has played fewer minutes (14 versus 17) but has started more frequently: he’s averaging 6.6 points per game, shooting 63.6 percent from two, and grabbing 3.1 rebounds. He is coming off career-night in Bologna with 28 points- Johannes Voigtmann, a highly experienced player, excellent shooter, and effective rebounder, is available at both center and power forward. He was limited by injury to 23 appearances, averaging 3.8 points and 3.4 rebounds in 13 minutes on the court.
THE BAYERN CONNECTION – Devin Booker played for Bayern from 2016 to 2019 and again from 2023 to 2025, making 72 EuroLeague appearances. Diego Flaccadori played for Bayern from 2019 to 2021, making 44 EuroLeague appearances. Leandro Bolmaro played in 30 games for Bayern, scoring 252 points. Johannes Voigtmann played in 64 games, scoring 384 points, also winning two league titles with Olimpia. David McCormack made his EuroLeague debut last season with Olimpia before moving to Alba Berlin. Nenad Dimitrijevic played for Olimpia during the last season and was the MVP of the Italian Supercup won by the club.
GAME NOTES – Armoni Brooks has made at least one three-pointer in 27 straight and 30 of his last 31 games. Josh Nebo ranks ninth in two-point accuracy at 70.9 percent. He ranks fourth in offensive rebounding with 2.3 per game. Zach LeDay ranks second in three-point accuracy at 50.0 percent. He has scored at least 10 points in 12 of his last 13 games; he has posted double-digit PIRs in 13 straight and 18 of his last 19 games; he has made at least one three-pointer in 13 straight and 18 of his last 19 games. He ranks 17th all-time in free throws made with 676. Zach LeDay is three points shy of Bob McAdoo’s all-time second place among Olimpia’s EuroLeague (1,292). Shavon Shields, with 157 appearances, is now alone in second place in EuroLeague appearances for Olimpia, ahead of Kaleb Tarczewski’s 156 and Nicolò Melli’s 180. Pippo Ricci is fourth with 153.
