Olympiakos won Panathinaikos for a 3rd consecutive time and won its 11th title! - Jun 14, 2015
As expected Olympiakos beat Panathinaikos for a third time in the play-offs and fifth in total this season to win its third title in the last twenty years and the 11th in total. Olympiakos was much better than Panathinaikos with Coach Manolopoulos (probably last game as Head Coach in Panathinaikos) not being able to get the bast out of Batista as these twenty days off courts were important for the center from Uruguay and his personal performance was not the expected one. The final score was 93-74 and Olympiakos sweeps the series for the first time ever against its opponent for the first time ever.
Vassilis Spanoulis (193-SG-82, agency: Beo Basket) was the top scorer of the game in his best game against hi ex team finishing the game with 23 points and 5 assists, followed by Pritnezzis 12 points and 6 rebounds, and Lojeski with 11 points and 5 rebounds.
From Panathinaikos in his most unlucky season ever (with all these injuries and penalties), top scorer was Vladimiros Jankovic with 17 points and 5 assists followed by Mavrokefalidis who scored 14 points but in only 18 minutes as he was fouled out quite early. Panathiniakos in general was worst than the previous two games and lost without a fight, especially on the second half where Olympiakos dominated in both edges of the court.
The next days will bring many changes to Panathinaikos who suffered his worst season since 1997-1998, with changes taking place in both the roster and in the coaching management with the Head Coach (according to rumors) already being signed while a number of players also being ready to wear the Green jersey for the next seasons to come. At the same time Olympiakos will (probably) suffer some roster changes as it is for sure that some key players this season will fairly seek for a better and bigger salary moving to leagues like the Spanish, the Turkish and the Russian. While some other ex red players being ready to come back to the Piraeus Team
Another Greek Cup for Panathinaikos - Apr 5, 2015
Panathinaikos beat easily Apollon PAtras 68-53 and celebrated its 16th Greek Cup (the fourth on the row) without facing any problem and the difference could have been much greater if Coach Ivanovic was not using the 16 years old Lountzis, Charalampopoulos and the 19 years old Diamantakos with Bochoridis for quite some time in the court and especially in the fourth period. The quality difference between the two teams was more than obvious and Panathinaikos even though came in the game without three of his key players (Nelson, Lawal, Blums) had not an issue at all. Panathinaikso simply played a solid defense over El Amin and Apollon had great difficulties in scoring. James Gist was the player to score the first basket (for three) while the Greens succeeded an early 0-9 before the top scorer of the match Toarlyn Fitzpatrick (203-F-89, college: S.Florida) scored the first two points for Apollon, Batista's goal-foul and two three pointers by Pappas and Fotsis the score went up to 12-21 in the first period.
The second was more or less the same with Pappas entering in the game quite "hot" followed by Mavrokefalidis the deficit reached very early the twenty points before a short come back by Apollon with Diamantidis scoring the last basket of the first half from down town for the 20-39.
The third period was a bit different as Apollon finally played some decent basketball with the loosing up by Panathiinaikos players (especially on the defense) but after the first 3-4 minutes PAnathinaikos begun to bombard the Patras basket and in no time the score went to +26: 57-31 by the end of the period.
So the last typical period and after the first couple of minutes Coach Ivanovic changed all his players and in Panathinaikos for more than 6 minutes five Greek players were playing for Panathinaikos with Bochoridis, Lountzis, Jankovic, Diamantakos and Charalampopoulos closing the game and with Fitzpatric finding obviously some clear shots to end up in 19 points and help his team go back to Patras with a decent deficit. MVP of the game was Loukas Mavrokefalidis (207-C-84)
