A valuable victory with an amazing turnaround from -14 in the last quarter was achieved by Olympiacos in Belgrade: 69-74 over Partizan, in front of 20,000 fanatical fans at Stark Arena.
The bad start forced Olympiakos to chase early: 22-13 in the 9th minute. Williams-Goss and Wright helped the champion of Greece temporarily recover: 28-28. However, the Serbs led 40-32 at the break after an unsportsmanlike foul by McKissick. Partizan reached a double-digit difference with an abundance of offensive rebounds, 46-36, 52-38.
The counterattack of the “red and whites” with a 0-12 streak at the beginning of the fourth period brought them to 59-58 with baskets by Papanikolaou and an indirect three-pointer by Walkup. Olympiacos overtook the exuberant Kostas Papanikolaou with a scorer: 61-64. Lorentzakis made it 67-69, Fal nailed it for 69-71 at 31” and Williams-Goss sealed the double from the line with 13” left after Kaminski’s missed shot.
Nigel Williams-Goss led Olympiakos with 17 points, while Kostas Papanikolaou had 13 and Isaiah Kanaan 10.
Giorgos Bartzokas also used Walkap 11, Larentzaki 3, McKissick 4, Peters 3, Sikma, Fall 7, Wright 6. The injured Serbs Milutinov, Petrusev were absent.
From Zeljko Obradovic’s team, former “red and white” Kevin Pander scored 19 points against his old team, while Zac LeDay was absent due to injury. Former “green” Mateus Ponitka added 8 points. Campoclo 13, Kaminski 14, Dozier 12 also distinguished themselves. Among the spectators of the match were Dino Raja, Tony Kukocs.
Now Olympiacos has 20 wins and 12 losses and is hoping to be placed in the top four. The top six teams in the final standings will qualify directly for the playoffs, while the next four will claim two tickets to play-off matches. Partisan has a record of 14-18.
In their final two games of the regular season, Olympiacos will face Red Star, again in Belgrade, and Fenerbahce in Faliro.
Panathinaikos, who are in the top four of the standings with a record of 20-11, will be tested in Bologna against the powerful Virtus on Friday night (21.30). In the rest of his schedule he has to play with Bayern in Munich and with Alba in OAKA.
Real leads with a 25-6 record and has secured first place and absolute home court advantage in the playoffs. Barcelona leads 21-11.
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