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Panathinaikos AKTOR made sure to be tougher than Bologna, Grant became the man who would deliver the victory and Yiannis Fileris writes about a difficult win for Panathinaikos in one of the lucky Euroleague stadiums for him
The stadium in principle. Gouriko since 2002. After last year’s passage through fire and iron with Nan’s basket. This is how it happened this year in Bologna for Panathinaikos. The Italians are a tough nut to crack, they took the match where they like it, physical contact, on the basketball stick and threatened until the end. But there was the most determined player on his roster.
Jerian Grant doesn’t have the flash of Nunn, although between us he has more NBA games than his teammate, nor the insight of Sluka. But it does everything and it pays off. He falls furiously on the best attacker of the opponents, presses the balls, gets rebounds and when necessary determines the development of the games. As he did in Palamalaguti, when Virtus had leveled the match.
The three-pointer, the pass to Lessor, the rebound, the two shots all together for Panathinaikos to escape from a difficult home ground and reach 7-3. What Nunn and Slukas had done in the first half was completed by this great guard, who is always ready either for a defense or to hit the last shot.
Wood with three points
A lot of wood fell in the first quarter with both teams determined not to concede a basket. For two minutes he hadn’t even opened the scoring, with Bologna having thrown the dynamic Cordinier on Nan and Diouf (instead of Zizic) to the dismay of Lesor. The “greens” had their eyes on Clyburn (with Grant chasing him everywhere) and Sengelia (his first opponent was Mitoglou).
The mutual neutralization led both of them to a satisfying match, until Lessor started to solve the riddles and Papapetrou scored twice from a distance, giving the signal for how PAO should attack this evening. Virtus’ defense had adapted to the traps in Nantes (Paiola came out with the help of Cordinier) but the American scorer, like a good boy, had another path.
He found the good distances and started hitting three-pointers, opening up the defense and receiving well the passes of his teammates, especially Kostas Sloukas. The captain of Panathinaikos entered just before the end of the first quarter and became the main reason to … watch basketball. His ability to perfectly direct his team was immediately apparent, the ball began to circulate perfectly, evidenced by the five assists he dished out, playing on substance only in the second period.
The defensive play of the first period was followed by an offensive crescendo. Panathinaikos with Nan having 14p and all the “green” shooting 9/14 three-pointers (as many as two-pointers, by coincidence) showed they were ready to escape. The difference reached +8, but Virtus stayed in the game because they followed PAO in shooting (5/9 tr) and grabbed 7 offensive rebounds.
On par with Bologna
In the end, the Italians found the opportunity to score 5 points in a row with Clyburn and reduce the score to three. It remained to be seen if Panathinaikos had played the match to his liking, because your one and one mine in the attack theoretically favored him. But the match did not go to this tempo. The hosts changed the tempo, insisted on the dynamic defenses and the “greens” saw their only accuracy from distance abandon them.
Panathinaikos’ 2/10 three-pointers kept Virtus at bay as Sloukas grew tired and Nan … grew irritated. Especially in the case, when he asked for a jamball while the referees gave a foul against him, they took him out of his clothes! Mostly, however, he was charged with a fourth foul.
The individual score in the period was 15-14 in favor of the Italians, with the hosts even having half the points from the foul line (7/11).
A wound for the “greens” remained the many offensive rebounds of Virtus who could have passed in front of the score if the enthusiastic Cordinier had not missed two … nails! The truth is, however, that we had returned from basketball to wood…
And in Grant’s hand
In theory, the low score (below 80 points) favored Virtus, which is qualitatively worse than Panathinaikos. It would be perfectly true if Gerryan Grant was not on the “green” roster. The hidden floor manager of the “green” team made all the right decisions in the end. And he did what was necessary for his team to leave victorious.
In the tie and with the clock ticking down to the last minute of the match, he hit a very difficult three-pointer, with Sengelia almost hanging on him. He then played on the home team’s nerves, keeping the ball and passing to Lessor who eluded Clyburn and nailed it to keep Panathinaikos at +3. Grant hadn’t … finished. He got the rebound, won Cordinier’s (fifth) foul and made both shots.
He was responsible for seven of his team’s last ten points. The other three were scored by Nan (on a three-shot night) and Hernangometh who collected the offensive rebound and with an easy layup completed the great double for PAO, who wrote two out of two in the “devil’s week”.
Ataman breathed a sigh of relief because it was a strange night, where the home team scooped up offensive rebounds (13 total), his team made a lot of mistakes (13) but got as tough as they needed to not die. Grant proved decisive, taking over from Sluka-Nan who gave a recital in the first half, but then tired. Lessor fought and won his battles with a game usual for him (16p-8p) while the honorable mention goes to Panagiotis Kalaitzakis who played … in the half of the field (in handball exchanges with Nan) but closed every lane in the dangerous Cordinier.
Panathinaikos reached seven wins in 10 matches, having played most of its games away from OAKA (4-2) and is on track for first place, which currently belongs to Fenerbahçe. His next outing (in Kaunas, against Zalgiris) is even more difficult. He won’t be afraid, obviously. Especially when he is so tough, as in the historic Palamalaguti, which he defeated in 2002 in the historic final-four and the conquest of the third in the Euroleague series…
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