Olympiacos Piraeus destroyed archrival Panathinaikos OPAP Athens to gain a resounding 101-73 victory on Thursday night – the biggest-ever EuroLeague win for the Reds over the Greens.
Olympiacos destroys Panathinaikos, 101-73, in derby



Olympiacos took off at a record-breaking pace to lead 38-13 at the end of the first quarter, and although Panathinaikos briefly rallied after the break, the home team’s dominance was never threatened. Kostas Sloukas and Sasha Vezenkov led six Olympiacos scorers in double digits with 16 points apiece. Moustapha Fall, Kostas Papanikolaou and Hassan Martin all scored 13 and Shaquielle McKissic contributed 10 points, 8 rebounds and 6 assists. Panathinaikos guard Daryl Macon topped all scorers with 23 points and the Greens also had good contributions from Georgios Papagiannis (18 points) and Nemanja Nedovic (16). Olympiacos improved to 18-10 to stay in the top four while Panathinaikos fell to 7-20.
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Olympiacos started red-hot with Fall scoring twice inside – including a dunk-and-one after he blocked a shot at the other end – and also assisting baskets for Papanikolaou and Thomas Walkup for a 10-2 lead. Nedovic responded with a jumper and an alley-oop feed to Papagiannis, but Fall scored two more baskets and Vezenkov added a three-point play to make it 17-6. Long-range strikes from Tyler Dorsey, Livio Jean-Charles and Papanikolaou continued the hosts’ magnificent first quarter, before Sloukas also hit from deep and Dorsey beat the first-quarter buzzer with a tip-in for a 38-13 score.
The second quarter started with more of the same as Martin scored close the basket and Papanikolaou netted on a fastbreak. Papagiannis from inside and Nedovic from long-range gave Panathinaikos some offense, but a triple from McKissic maintained a massive advantage, 47-18. Another three-pointer from Sloukas brought up Olympiacos’s half-century midway through the second quarter, before two more baskets from Papagiannis and a three-point play from Macon boosted the visitors to 53-25. Another Nedovic to Papagiannis alley-oop kept Panathinaikos moving, but 4 more points for Martin took Olympiacos to a 58-33 halftime lead.
A tip-in from Eleftherios Bochoridis and a triple from Macon started the second half, before Vezenkov’s inside score was bettered by another Macon three, a Papagiannis jumper and another Nedovic triple, making it 60-46 after a 2-13 run. But the Panathinaikos fightback would not last. Vezenkov sparked Olympiacos from deep, Sloukas added a mid-range jumper and Vezenkov dunked off a steal. Papanikolaou added a stepback three to extend the lead to 70-48 before Fall scored twice, Sloukas drove for a layup and Vezenkov netted in transition for a 15-1 run and a 78-51 lead at the end of the third.
Vezenkov from close-range and Sloukas from deep extended the lead to 30 points, 83-53, before McKissic added another triple as the home fans started their celebrations early. Papagiannis scored twice for Panathinaikos, but McKissic and Vezenkov made the margin 90-57. Nedovic and Papanikolaou traded triples before Martin twice dunked for the biggest lead of the game, 97-62. Georgios Printezis came off the bench for a layup, and after 5 more points for Macon, the hosts took their tally into three figures with free throws from McKissic to seal a superb performance.