Paris Basketball survived a thriller to become the lone lower seed to advance past through the 7DAYS EuroCup Eighthfinals last week. With nearly all the favorites advancing but just two scoring double-digits wins, things could be very tight in the quarterfinals.
That begs the question: How well has this group of teams finished close games this season? The table below ranks the remaining contenders by their clutch efficiency differential. A clutch situation, in this case, is defined as any possession in the last five minutes of the fourth quarter or overtime with the margin on the scoreboard within 5 points.
While some teams have played more clutch possessions than others – Prometey, for example, has played nearly twice as many as Hapoel – the fact remains that how these teams performed in key moments is a big reason they have made it this far. The fact that all these teams have a positive differential and most of them are exceptionally high speaks to that fact. To this point, Hapoel, and Promitheas have set the curve in late game situations, but with five teams posting a differential above the 0.20-mark, most of these teams have done a spectacular job finding ways to make things work when the moment has called for it.
