By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Laboral Kutxa once more made a great came back and after a rocky start in the season, qualified for Top16 and pushed Valencia to Eurocup. Also Olympiacos beat Crvena Zvezda in a special game and Real Madrid prevailed over Sassari.
In Vitoria once more “character Baskonia” made its miracle. Laboral Kutxa got even an 11 points lead (83-72) with four minutes to go and finally got the 93-89 win over Valencia. The hosts had the lead for most of the game, they controlled the boards (38-24) and the best that Valencia could do was to get within four points (91-87) with 20 second to go. Fabien Causer with 21 points and important baskets in crunch time was the best for the winners who also controlled the boards (38-25). Valencia, despite its effort, will now have the chance to defend the title of the Eurocup winner.
Olympiacos beat Crvena Zvezda (64-59) in a game dedicated to the memory of Marko Ivanovic and to the special relationship between the two clubs. It was not a beautiful game and Kostas Sloukas with 9 points proved to be the key player for the winners who sealed mathematically the top spot of their group. Boban Marjanovic once more had a double double (17 p., 13 r.) for the guests, but it was not enough.
Real Madrid got the 83-58 road win over already disqualified Dinamo Sassari, despite not having Sergio Rodriguez available. Even without “El Chacho” the gap of quality between the two teams is great and it was proven on the court. Real was better in every aspect of the game and the partial score in the last quarter was 29-7 for the Spaniards.