Panathinaikos caught top notch velocity at both ends of the court to down Aris in a home game by 90-56.
Panathinaikos led first after tip-off. It ran a quick 6-0 streak behind a couple of triples drained by Nicholas only to go for a bigger run (7-0) when Aris managed to pick up the slack and tie (6-6 at 2’, 13-6 at 4’), leaving few margins of reaction for David Blatt who started to swap players early opting to nail the specific scheme that would be able to provide the answers to Zeljko Obradovic’s team. The greens however at no point allowed their rivals to doubt their superlative. They got to a 10 point cushion at 6’50’’ (18-8) as Nicholas connected with Marcus Haislip for a show time aley-oop, the latter flushing the ball notoriously. All good things began in backcourt, where traps, great teammate collaborations and back-up even from the entire bench, proving everyone’s passion to succeed during the entire clash; Fighting for every ball which possession was in question, for every board up for grabs. Haislip’s dunk plus a pair of offense buzzer beaters three-pointers, one sunk almost from mid-court by Dimitris Diamantidis and another under asphyxiating defense pulled by Vassilis Spanoulis were the high-lights of the first half, which concluded with the greens up by 43-32, Obradovic having almost cleared off the bench by using 11 out of 12 players in his disposal.
Panathinaikos returned on court determent to wrap thing up, jogged to a +17 edge (49-32, 23’) and +18 (56-38 at 26’30’’, 58-40 at 27’30’’), only for third quarter to end at 62-45. Slightly before Spanoulis upped the ante to +20 getting range from beyond the arc (65-45, 30’40’’), Antonis Fotsis picking up were he left off to expand the gap to +30 (75-45, 34’10’’), greatest difference being a +34 advantage (84-50 at 37’45’’, 86-52 at 38’15’’, 90-56 at 39’45’’). The encounter concluded at 90-56 having Paanthinaikos as the star character of the session, Obradovic ultimately clearing off the bench while the gap expanded further and further down the stretch up to final prevalence.
Referees: Voreadis, Papadimitriou, Bitis
Quarters: 25-17, 43-32, 62-45, 90-56
Panathinaikos (Obradovic): Tepic 2, Spanoulis 7 (6 as), Perperoglou 6, Batiste 6, Fotsis 11 (7rbs), Haislip 6, Nicholas 13, Diamantidis 5, Pekovic 11, Clathes 9, Shermadini 7, Verginis 7
Aris (Baltt): Clarck 6, Argiropoulos 1, Miles, Betts 6, Labovic, Richardson 9, Hatzivrettas 10, Dikoudis 7, Skordilis 4, Paunic 4, Kakiouzis 6, Barlos 3
*Kostas Tsartsaris (injury), Yorgos Bogris and Sarunas Jasikevicius were not included in the official line-up.
*Nikos Hatzivrettas was welcomed with a warm round of applause so much at the initial presentation of the teams as after his first attempts in the game, by all the Panathinaikos’ fans
