Alieu Badara Njie is a 6'8'' wiry athlete with good hops and adequate lateral mobility. A member of the Wallidan team in Gambia this athletic power forward is still in the development phase ,but could materialize into a solid talent. When I saw him this past summer in Banjul, what I liked about him was his quickness for his size. Granted, he is a work in progress offensively, but in the right program he could be brought along to be a valuable defensive presence. I keep bringing up Pierre Jallow, but he is a prime example of an African athlete who transformed into a player. Jallow was a volleyball player and attended William Jewell College ( NAIA 2) and has become one of the most successful Gambian pro players alongside Boubacar Bojang.Alieu Badara Njie (203-F/C-88) Alieu might have that potential.

Olympiakos Volou - Komotini 79-98
Coach Lemonidis's team having in a great day Christos Tsakonitis (188-G/F-83) who finished the game with 26 points and another three players with double digits did not phase any problem against the weakest team in the division.
Quarters: 22-27, 42-53, 62-77, 79-98
Olympiakos Volou: Vogiatzis 2, Tsourelis 12, Fountas 2, Nanis 30, Arnaoutakis 2, Politis 8, Tsolis 17, Michos 6
Komotini: Mastrokostopoulos 3, Mouratoglou 7, Lehoudis 2, Dinas 9, Koutsovasilis 14, Christos Tsakonitis 26, Holevas 14, Veli 3, Souflias 18, Halil 2.

Ermis Lagkada - Lavrio 75-75, OT 83-82
With one shot from the charity line Troulialis gave the victory to the Lagkadas team bogging at the same time Serelis's dreams for A2.
Quarters: 20-16, 35-37, 64-55, 75-75, 83-82OT
Ermis Lagkada: Troulialis 11, Nikos Kloutzos (190-G) 15, Paritsis 10, Bellos 6, Vourlitis 2, Siolios 13, Gamouras 4, Akepsimaidis 2, Tasos Dimitriadis (201-C-82) 20 (2).
Lavrio: Trikaliotis 7, Rallis 7, N. Kousoulas 10, Giannakopoulos 15, Notis 6, Kassianos 4, Bakas 7, Psileas 26 (3).

Doukas - Anagennisis/Floga 86-74
Great game in Doukas's closed court with the home team winning the game due to their charismatic and talented Alexandros Petrakis (200-F-87) who did everything in the court, 24 points, 8 rebounds, 5 assists and 3 steals.
Quarters: 20-18, 40-42, 59-57, 86-74.
Doukas: Tsohlas 17, Kamariotis 2, Alexandros Petrakis 24, Achis 8, Kouvaris 4, Kritsalos 16, Matzioris 8, Karatzios 7
Anagennisi/Floga: Rozolis 5, Moisiadis 3, Pittakas 11, Sidiropoulos 10, Thymnios 2, Zarogiannis 22, Spiropoulos 3, Pallis

Milonas - Aigio 71-86
Quarters: 36-20, 47-45, 61-65, 71-86.
Milonas: Kalaitzakis 3, Ventouris 15, Karababas 8, Mubarak 5, Vlavianos 14, Kiritsis 6, Bikas 5 (1), Ballas 15.
Aigio: Prokos 14, Gioupis 3, Stamopoulos 10, Tirlas 26, Deraos 5, Manolas 12, Stavroulakis 16.

Ikaroi Serron - Amyntas 63-49
The home team was much better then their opponents and only during the second quarter they really had some trouble, other than, that and when Dorkofikis stopped scoring Ikaroi serron took a big lead a the 3rd quarter and they kept it until the end, MVP of the game was Asimakis.
Quarters: 13-11, 29-24, 53-36, 63-49.
Ikaroi Serron: Pehlivanis 11, Georgantzas 5, Tsanakas 6, Pappoudas 4, Asimakis 23, Giavropoulos 1, Topouzis 13.
Amyntas: Zoupas 6, Barbas 3, Samothrakis 9, Grammatikos 9, Boutros 1, Korizis 6, Dorkofikis 16, Vogiatzis 3, Christoforakis 3.

KAOD - Alimos 85-65
In Drama, there was a good game only for 20 minutes when Alimos through Tsolakis tried to defend it self with Tsolakis, when Elias Armenis key players got tired they loose the game quite easy.
Quarters: 16-10, 40-33, 65-52, 85-65.
KAOD: Papadopoulos 8, Kiosses 6, Filiousis 26, Michaelidis 15, Maslarinos 4, Koukouravas 16, Daliaris 10
Alimos (New Head Coach Armenis): Moutoupas 11, Tsolakis 14, Il. Vrinas 6, Bourousis 3, Ifantis 9, Kallimanas 7, Tzouggarakis 7, St. Vrynas 6, Thomas 2.

Goumenissa - Near East 67-68
Another game for the top performers in the league, ending at a point, that was the fourth game which Near East wins with the minimum difference of 1 point, this seazon
Quarters: 22-23, 38-42, 49-54, 67-68
Goumenissa: Bagi 12, meridis 12, Matenidis 9, Klepkos 22, Andreadis 9, Gotsos 3.
Near East: Nikou 8, Michalos 2, Lykogiannis 7, Kouklakis 9, Papoulidis 16, Neofytou 7, Sizopoulos 6, Papargiropoulos 4, Fasoulopoulos 2.

Makedonikos - Ikaros Kallitheas 64-67
A derby took place at Makedonikos's court with the home team very near to a big surprise but at the end Ikaros Kallitheas (which are very close to the promotion with this win as they remained at the second place and alone) succeeding the positive result with Emmanouilidis and Katoufas being the top scorers and performers for Coach Haritatos team.
Quarters: 11-22, 22-40, 42-56, 64-67.
Makedonikos: Bohoridis 4, Dalpas 19, Tanakidis 11, Kalthopoulis 3, Mitsakis 9, Kogias 2, Pappoulidis 4, Samourelis 12.
Ikaros Kallitheas: Georgiou 10, Delichristos 4, Emmanouilidis 17, Papadakis 2, Katranas 7, Karastamatis 6, Aggelopoulos 2, Katoufas 15, Koukouras 4.

Top scorers after 20 weeks:
Dimitris Prokos (192-G-74) of Aigio 441 points
Nick Psileas (200-F-80) of Lavrio 372 points
Panagiotis Tsolis (194-F-81) of Olympiakos Volou 347 points (in 19 games)
Panagiotis Nanis (195-F/G-80) of Olympiakos Volou 356 points (in 18 games)
Giorgos Tirlas (198-F-80) of Aigio 332 points
Nicos Papakonstantinou (182-G-84) of Ermis Lagkada 292 points
Konstantinos Pehlivanis (192-G-79) of Ikaroi Serron 286 points
Kostas Dinas (189-G/F-80) of Komotini 275 points
Giorgos Filiousis (198-G-77) of KAOD 275 points
Michalis Tanakidis (190-G-81) of Makedonikos 272 points
Sotiris Katoufas (206-F-79) of Ikaros Kallitheas 265 points
Tassos Baggi (187-G-75) of Goumenissa 257 points
Tasos Dimitriadis (201-C-82) of Ermis Lagkada 240 points
Nikos Michalos (192-G-77) of Near East 232 points
Theologos Vlavianos (196-G-86) of Milonas 235 points
Dionysios Giannakopoulos (195-G/F-82) of Lavrio 219 points
Mihalis Ifantis (204-F-72) of Alimos 219 points
Nikos Moisiadis (180-G-80) of Anagennisi Floga 216 points
Nikos Kritsalos (192-G-77) of Doukas 215 points
Dimitris Karatzios (202-F-78) of Doukas 186 points (in 18 games)

Results March 1, 2008:

Current FEB leader MyGuide Amsterdam continue to let the good times roll, keeping the momentum going heading into Tuesday's Dutch Cup showdown wih title contender West-Brabant Giants, winning over defending Dutch champion Eiffel Towers 82-69.

leading scorers MyGuide:

Barquisimeto, Venezuela.- Venezuelan center Pablo Machado (207-C-77, college: Loyola Marymount) declared from Spain, where he plays in the EBA league for Domo Residencial Oviedo, that he's only asking for the 'respect' of the contract agreement of his 2007 season with Guaros de Lara in Venezuela's LPB and to be paid the 23.000 dollars left, cause he doesn't want to stop playing in Venezuela, in a phone interview conceeded from Oviedo to Diario El Impulso of Barquisimeto.

A former Senior Team of Venezuela member, Machado has also played for teams such as Panteras de Miranda, Cocodrilos de Caracas and Marinos de Anzoategui and had been loaned by Guaros de Lara to Gaiteros del Zulia only for 2008, in exchange for power forward and center Luis Julio (199-F-80), even though he hadn't been completed paid on his 2007 salary.

The debt
'Last time I got in touch with Guaros was two weeks ago, when owner Carlos Garcia sent me an e-mail message in which he made the compromise of paying me. I supposed that, by then, he knew I had told Gaiteros that I would not got back and play for them unless Guaros paid me first', said Pablo.
Number 31 said that the promises date back from May of 2007, the day after Guaros were eliminated in the Quarter Finals round by Cocodrilos de Caracas. The management told him he was going to get paid and his contract included money that hadn't been paid to him from the 2006 LNB season, when he defended Guerreros de Lara, team that's also owned by Total Sport and that is now known as Lideres de Yaracuy.
'They changed my contract without letting me know and wanted to pay me in bolivares instead of dollars. There was a moment in which I even agreed to be paid in bolivares, cause I had debts and finantial problems, but they still didn't pay me back', he said.
'They didn't call me to play in Yaracuy cause they still owed me money, so I decided to play for Torrevieja in Spain and later on this team also had finantial trouble and withdrew from LEB Bronze. Then I started playing for Oviedo. Guaros told me they had aprooval from Cadivi to pay me with dollars, but they have all my account numbers and still have not deposited anything', Machado explained.
His trade to Gaiteros was 'just too much' for him to handle, so he called the president of LPB, Rolando Urdaneta. When Gaiteros told him they would try and work out the trouble with his debt, he decided to way, but he's still worried. 'It's been almost a year and I can't go back and play for free. I'm tired of waiting. I have a wife and responsibilities with my family'.

Still available

Despites all of that, and the fact the he considers himself 'the big looser in this whole story', Machado says he'd still be willing to negotiate with Gaiteros, Guaros or any other team to play in LPB this year, but only after he gets paid completely what he is owed. 'If I'm going to negotiate with Guaros, my attitude off course will not be the same. I'd have to request money in advance and only through my agent, and not personally', he said. 'They ask for you to be patient when you want to get your money, but the banks are not patient with you. They'll just take away whatever you put as guarantee. With Marinos or Cocodrilos I never lived something like this and with Guaros is the first time'.

Thanks to Julio

When Machado learned that power forward and center Luis Julio refused to play for Guaros, claiming that he is 'uncomfortable' with the fact that Machado hasn't been paid, Machado said he was 'gratefully surprised' and 'speechless', cause he didn't know how to thank Julio for such a decision. 'It's not normal for a player to have that level of solidarity', he declared. 'If there were more players like him, with conscience of what the working rights are for, and if we had more union as basketball players, I'm sure we'd get a lot more benefits from teams that we currently do to work'.

'With Julio I shared time in Delfines and the National Squad of Venezuela. I'm very content about his attitude. I hope this situation works out quickly so he doesn't have to pay or ends up hurt by this debt. I feel very proud of his values as a person', said Machado. The two times runner-up in Venezuela's LPB with Guaros and former player of the World Cups of Indianapolis 2002 and Japan 2006, also had some words for the fans in Barquisimeto.

'I send my best regards to you. I always felt great there. They supported me a lot even in my worst time as a pro basketball player. Their attitude helped me to overcome that and reach my level in the latter part of last season. Thanks also for following up my work in Spain. I'm here trying to help Oviedo climb to the next cathegory though it's been hard for me to get adapted'.