The hosts held the EuroLeague leader to 36 second-half points as they clinched their second win in a row
Panathinaikos’s defense suffocates Hapoel as Greens end double-round week in style
Game Report
3 Mins read
Regular Season
Round 17 of 38
Regular Season
Panathinaikos AKTOR AthensPAO
9382
Hapoel IBI Tel AvivHTA
Overview
w
w
l
l
w
l
w
w
w
l
Panathinaikos AKTOR Athens came into the double-round week on the back of two straight losses against Valencia Basket and EA7 Emporio Armani Milan. It wasn't about to get any easier either, as the Greens had to lock horns with defending champion Fenerbahce Beko Istanbul on the road before hosting EuroLeague leader Hapoel IBI Tel Aviv at home.
But when the going gets tough, the tough get going. This week, Panathinaikos has demonstrated again what this team is made of.
Less than 48 hours after holding Fererbahce to 77 points in a 77-81 win, Ergin Ataman’s side managed to suffocate one of EuroLeague’s best offenses, ending the week with a 93-82 victory over Hapoel.
The Panathinaikos head coach set the tone from the off by leaving his star guard trio of TJ Shorts, Kostas Sloukas and Kendrick Nunn on the bench. In came Jerian Grant and Panagiotis Kalaitzakis, who were assigned with the mission of containing Vasilije Micic and Round 16 MVP Elijah Bryant.
A back-and-forth affair in the opening stages was followed by a 13-0 run by the hosts, who held Hapoel scoreless for 4 minutes to grab a 20-8 lead.
“In the beginning of the game, our plan was to be aggressive against their two key players, Micic and Bryant, and we were successful in this with Kalaitzakis and Grant,” Ataman told the post-game press conference. “We made perfect defense, we didn’t let them find their usual baskets on the pick-and-roll shots, their penetrations in the paint.”
The contest would turn into a game of runs as Hapoel bounced back, demonstrated its offensive prowess and secured a 41-45 advantage before the break.
At halftime, Hapoel head coach Dimitris Itoudis stressed that his players needed to “play like there’s no tomorrow on defense”. Yet, it was his former team that would do so in the second half.
Panathinaikos held the visitors to just 16 points in the third quarter, taking a 65-62 lead into the fourth which they opened with a 15-4 surge to practically finish the game off.
The Greens forced Hapoel into 13 turnovers on a night that Itoudis’s team made just 9 of their 29 three-point attempts and missed as many as 11 free throws, despite boasting a league-high 83.7% from the line heading into Thursday’s clash. Bryant went 1 for 4 from the line and Micic scored just 4 points, with the two men combining for 4 turnovers.
Panathinaikos’s mentality coming into this week was personified in Nunn, who shook off an ankle injury he picked up the day before the game against Fener and barely trained the next few days but pulled off back-to-back MVP outings, scoring a combined 44 points in this week’s games.
“First and foremost, I just want to thank God for my ability,” Nunn told EuroLeague TV after netting 13 of his 19 points in the second half against Hapoel. “I was hobbling around for the last two, three days with the ankle, but when game-time comes, adrenaline gets going and I’m bringing whatever I can to the game.
“We played Fener, the reigning champs, and Hapoel, they’re no.1 in the standings right now. So, two big games. The lights are bright, I’m going to get out there. As long as I’m not on crutches, anything like that, God willing, I’m going to play if I’m able, for sure.”
The Greens are set to travel to Lithuania, where they’ll take on Zalgiris Kaunas next week in their bid to bag their third straight victory.
Panathinaikos does boast offensive talent in abundance and should it manage to consistently defend as it did this week, their fans can dream big again this season.
