By Vaggelis Papadimitriou / info@eurohoops.net
ABU DHABI – In a third-place game, which was practically a warm-up for the Greek League finals, Olympiacos beat Panathinaikos 97-93 in a game that will end up being a footnote.
Alec Peters with 32 points and Sasha Vezenkov with 23 led the winners, while Moses Wright also had a great game with 19 points. Peters tied the Final Four record for most points scored in a game.
On the other side, Omer Yurtseven scored 23 points and Cedi Osman had 14, while Mathias Lessort added 12 points.
Stars like Evan Fournier and Kendrick Nunn played limited minutes, Nikola Milutinov and Kostas Sloukas weren’t even used as both sides treat the game partly like a glorified practice.
Keenan Evans stayed inactive for this game, despite expecting him to finally make his season debut, while Nigel Williams-Goss, Kostas Papanikolaou, and Tyler Dorsey were also rested by Olympiacos.
Panathinaikos also missed Juancho Hernangomez and Ioannis Papapetrou for the same reason
A game of runs
Olympiacos had a great start in the game, leading by 15 (31-16) and closing the first period with a 33-20 score, while Peters and Vezenkov had already scored 13 and 12 points, respectively.
Panathinaikos managed to come back in the second quarter with a 12-3 run (36-32). Olympiacos pushed the lead back to nine (49-40) after a goal-foul by Wright, extended it to 15 (57-42) after a three by Vezenkov, and at the end of the first half, they had the advantage with 57-46.
Meanwhile, the Greens didn’t have any player in double digits, with former NBA prospect Alexandros Samodurov scoring eight points on 3/3 FG.
Panathinaikos once more trimmed the lead to five (67-62) in the third period, and Olympiacos pushed it back to 11 (75-64) at the end of the quarter.
The Reds led by 15 (89-74) again with five minutes left, and the game was over with Panathinaikos trimming the final point difference in the closing minutes.