Victory and qualification for ‘Thrylos’
Olympiacos edged 74-59 Aris on the road, and after reaching a 2-0 record, qualified for the Greek League semis, where he will be playing against Panionios with a home court advantage.
The game started with excellent defensive game by our team. In offense, the ball was always played in the post and thus the ‘reds’ took a 8-17 lead keeping the hosts below ten points in the first quarter.
Giorgos Printezis took over, Dunston helped the offense as well and hence our team for the first time reached a two digit difference. Mantzaris and Sloukas were organizing properly and executing as needed and Thrylos had built a +10 difference on its behalf at half time (26-36).
At the beginning of the third quarter, Aris made a six points game (32-38), but from that point on the team of Giorgos Bartzokas following a partial 2-15 and with Spanoulis, Perperoglou and Printezis being unstoppable, made a 34-53 score. The difference was actually at 21 points (38-59) following a three by Vangelis Mantzaris at 29’ and the third quarter ended 40-59.
Our team played as needed to maintain the two digit difference in the last quarter and thus got both the victory (59-74) and the qualification.
Τhe quarters: 8-17, 26-36, 40-59, 59-74
Aris (Minic): Bochoridis 10 (1), Pelekanos 4, Gkikas 5 (1), Tsakaleris 6, Asimakopoulos 9 (1), Charisis 10, Larentzakis 9 (1), Sarikopoulos 1, Mourtos 5 (1).
Olympiacos (Bartzokas): Petway 6 (2), Dunston 6 (9reb), Spanoulis 15 (2 3p, 7as), Perperoglou 10 (2), Papapetrou, Sloukas 8 (2), Collins 5 (6 reb.), Simmons 3, Printezis 10 (1), Mantzaris 9 (3), Kavvadas, Christodoulou.
MILAN MINIC: “Congratulations to Giorgos for the beautiful basketball played by Olympiacos and I wish them all the best. We tried to be a stronger opponent for Olympiacos tonight and gather more experience for the future and next season. The fans are going to be here next season as well. We have many financial problems. I would like to thank my associates, the players and Mr. Angelou for a program built and followed by me. What remains from the season is a basic roster for the next one. When Athinaiou left we had to make a tough but right decision. He leaving changed our goals and our basic goal was not to face any problems keeping the category. After continuous wins we changed our goal into making the sixth ranking spot but we did not make it. No one had thought that Aris would come so close as to winning the sixth place, everyone was speculating about what would happen to the team after Athinaiou leaving, but you have all witnessed that finally happened”.
ANTONIS ASIMAKOPOULOS: “I don’t have many things to say about the game, we weren’t having any illusions about the series against Olympiacos. The class different is so huge that weren’t allowed to make any second thoughts and what we wanted was to be as competitive as possible. I believe we overcame ourselves by qualifying to the Greek Cup final and making the play-offs. We wish to thank the administration for helping us since we all know the huge problems they are dealing with. I also wish to thank the coach for coming here to help and teach us and I want to thank the fans for their warm applause in recognition of the effort rather than the result”.
GIORGOS BARTZOKAS: “Everyone was expecting this outcome not just for tonight but for the series as well. We have to focus on our really bad first half, we made 9 turnovers and this is not excusable, having won with a huge margin in the first half and not seeing Vezenkov with the Aris team during warm up were actually to blame for our approach to the game. We were better in the second half, Spanoulis saw to it, approaching the game with seriousness. Congratulations to Aris, I wish they are better and more competitive next season”.
GIORGOS PRINTEZIS: “We played against a very serious team that deserves recognition for everything they achieved in the season. We are now playing against another very good team going for three victories in the semis, we want to play as we should and according to plan. It’s true we did not play well in the first half, lost easy possessions and we did not do what was planned, which was to make a strong beginning”.
KOSTAS SLOUKAS: “We knew that Aris is very well prepared for every game, we started the game slow, but got better next and did not have any problems. We need to remain focused till the end”.