Panathinaikos had first say, held on to the lead throughout the entire encounter and finally prevailed over the extremely competitive Bayern Munich in Germany, behind final score 83-77; all this in the last game of the clover’s preparation period.
The greens showed that they are out to enforce their pace first minutes breaking away from tip-off, something to become all the more obvious when Maciulis shifted the score to 9-18 (8’20’’), Andy Panko going yet again for a very pleasing offensive game. Bayern Munich seemed to be in quite a counteracting mood not only when coming back from this 9 point deficit but actually all through the encounter. It got back to a 4 point distance (18-22, 11’) and from that point forward the scenario seemed to play out over and over again, Panathinaikos edging its opponent and the Germans running after it constantly. The clover climbed up to +8 (20-28 at 12’, 23-31 at 15’30’’), Bayern returned to a 2 point shadow (29-31, 17’24’’), Sofoklis Schortsanitis however getting down to business aided by Maciulis to get the score board reading 32-39 (19’30’’). The game went into recess, score resting at 35-39, seeing that at the half-time buzzer the referees called a foul of Kostas Tsartsaris on a three-point shot.
Panathinaikos managed to pick up the pace even further. 37-39 (10’20’’) after an 11-0 run turned into 37-50 (23’15’’), Panko and Armstrong to lead in frontcourt and then on to 40-53 (23’53’’) off a Maciulis attempt. Bayern attempted certain things, got good range from long distance, snatched offensive rebounds and actually managed to cut its trail down to 5 points (60-65). Let it be noted that at this point (28’14’’) and while the score board red 55-63, Diamantidis and the green bench were awarded technical fouls for protesting. Bayern Munich exploited the opportunity and closed the gap down to 3 points (60-63).
Armstrong and Diamantidis took hold of the clash’s reigns as the teams returned to the floor, move to result in a swift +11 for Panathinaikos (60-71). Home-team crept up (65-71, 33’), only for Tsartsaris to chip in 4 consecutive points to 65-75 (33’). The aforementioned after a small Schortsanitis parenthesis also got the score up to 67-78 (36’30’’). Ukic got the greens fly ahead to 69-80 (37’24’’)and then off to 73-83, only for the curtains to fall out on the field, final score 77-83.
Quarters: 16-22, 35-39, 60-65, 77-83
Bayern Munich (Christopoulos): Rice 16, Troutman 13, Hamann 5, Tomas 12, Nadfeji, Halperin 9, Benzing 2, Radosavljevic 2, Greene 3, Jagla 5, Homan 10
Panathinaikos (Pedoulakis): Bramos 5, Panko 14 (4rbs), Maciulis 13 (4rbs), Armstrong 10 (4rbs), Ukic 13 (5 as, 4rbs), Tsartsaris 6 (4rbs), Diamantidis 4 (6 as, 3rbs), Xanthopoulos, Schortsanitis 18 (3rbs)
