And it has to be noted that entering the tournament with the two centers of the team, George Papagiannis and Kostas Antetokounmpo, injured, didn’t help either. Still, the progress made by Giannis compared to the stubborn, but inexperienced player in FIBA rules seen in the 2019 World Cup, has been widely witnessed.īut the lack of a solid outside threat is haunting the Greek national team, as it also haunted for years the Milwaukee Bucks. Greece finished the game shooting 31% in threes, while Germany had an admirable 55%, for a total average of 40% in the tournament up to this point. On the defensive end, Greece let at the start of the game Germany get hot with 7/8 threes, and when in the second half the defense changed and the switches pushed Giannis in the perimeter, Germany took advantage of the mismatches in the paint for easy buckets and offensive rebounds, while continuing shooting excellently from the three-point line. Not exactly bad, however, it’s a number that gives hope to every opponent, guiding them to the risk of trying to contain Giannis, while leaving three-point shooters open. Mind you that Greece finished the tournament shooting 34,9% on threes. On the offensive end, except for Giannoulis Larentzakis (4/4 3PTS), the three-pointers of Tyler Dorsey (2/7 3PTS), Kostas Sloukas (1/4 3PTS), Kostas Papanikolaou (1/4 3PTS) and Giannis (1/5 3PTS) didn’t fall, despite many of them being open. With all the attention of the defense on Giannis and without a solid threat from the perimeter, Germany had a 20-1 run at the start of the second half that mentally destroyed the opponents. However, it was evident since the first knockout game against the Czech Republic that things are not going to be easy for Greece, which survived the Round of 16, but couldn’t make it past the hosts Germany. Giannis became the first Greek player since then to score at least 25+ in every game he played in the tournament. Galis famously scored 30+ points in every game of the Eurobasket 1987, which ended up being the big bang of Greek basketball as the host Hellas won the tournament, beating the USSR in the final. Giannis Antetokounmpo: a reliable three-point shot missingĪlthough Greece was eliminated in the quarterfinals, the Milwaukee Bucks star ended up challenging even the scoring numbers of Greek Eurobasket legend Nick Galis. The team is expected to present itself even stronger in the upcoming FIBA World Cup – if they qualify – having not only Jokic and Micic as their main stars but also Bogdan Bogdanovic who was injured this summer. The future outlook for Serbia remains more than positive. The truth is that Serbia dominated a relatively easy group phase and in the first sign of adversity, they seemed uncharacteristically shocked. And even if he didn’t say that, what would you expect from a 73 years old coach who has already won the Eurobasket and the FIBA World Cup? The blame here went straight to coach Svetislav Pesic, who will remain in his position and already declared that he will not change his ways. Meanwhile, Serbia had no reaction from the bench, while Italy was making big shot after big shot, and things quickly went south. You can attribute to that at least the breakout night of Marco Spissu who scored 22 points after averaging five in the previous five contests. The game turned upside down after the ejection and the reactions of coach Gianmarco Pozzecco, which, despite many Serbs stating the opposite, totally changed the momentum of the game. You can say that he was attacked on defense, but this is not news and nobody expected him to be a defensive stopper.Īnd in the crucial loss against Italy, the Joker returned home after his best performance statistically (32 p., 13 r., 41 EFF), while the rest of the team couldn’t contribute as much. He finished the tournament averaging 21.7 points, 10 rebounds, 4.3 assists, shooting 66.2% from the field, 46.2% from three points, and 90.9% from free throws. While the leaders of the Milwaukee Bucks and the Dallas Mavericks saw their hopes of winning shattered in the quarterfinals, Nikola Jokic came out of EuroBasket 2022 in the Round of 16 against Italy.
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