First road win for the Greens, as Reds lose again
Panathinaikos reached a 2-2 record in the Euroleague beating Zenit in St Petersburg on Thursday, while Olympiakos suffered a third reverse in four games going down at Baskonia on Friday.
A more consistent Panathinaikos secured its first road win of the season, beating Zenit 89-79 after leading for most of the night in Russia.
The Greek champion held on to the lead it built (up to 14 points, 63-49) fending off Zenit’s comeback efforts and having Jimmer Fredette (22 points) and DeShawn Thomas (17 points) on a high scoring night.
This time Nick Calathes stuck to what he does best, i.e. play-making instead of shooting, resulting in a whopping 15 assists, his third highest record in the Euroleague.
For the Greens, the problems remain in rebounds, but at least there has been some significant improvement in free throws (81 percent).
The Reds, on the other hand, had a rather poor second half of their game at Baskonia to lose 82-66.
Olympiakos, that has decided to appoint caretaking coach Kestutis Kemzura as its regular coach for the season, is still in search of defensive agility (31 rebounds against the hosts’ 51), conceding once again a high number of points with its Greek players underperforming.
Brandon Paul kept the Reds in the game with his five triples (15 points on the night), while Vassilis Spanoulis made 10 points, but with 3/12 field goals.
Significant changes are expected to the Piraeus team’s roster in the next few days, according to reports, a few weeks after the departure of coach David Blatt.
