F.C. Barcelona to smash Olympiacos
Round 16 of Euroleague will bring us another big match between Barcelona and Olympiacos, two huge teams with big Euroleague history. Last season both teams won a game away from their home, but this time won’t be the case because Barcelona is huge favourites in front of their fans.
For Barcelona, everything goes as they planned at the start of the season. They are on the second spot in both Euroleague and ACB and now there are in an 8-2 record in the last 10 games in all competitions. In the last round, they travelled to face Joventut, a decent team which are in a poor form right now. Barcelona’s defense worked very well, with their opponents scoring only 38% of their shots and collecting 18 turnovers in the game. In the end, Barcelona won the game 95-80, thanks to a nice display from Nikola Mirotic who ended the game with 23 points, 6 rebounds and 2 steals. Kyle Kuric (15 points and 3 rebounds) and Adam Hanga (14 points, 7 rebounds and 6 assists) also had big contributions in the game. Long absentees Heurtel and Pangos are still out for Barcelona.
Olympiacos form isn’t that good as they wanted to before a big game like this. They lost to Panathinaikos, Real Madrid and Crvena Zvezda and won against Khimki Moscow in their last 4 games. They need to pay very much attention to Barcelona’s offensive skills and defend as hard as they can to have a chance to get a nice result in this encounter. In their last game against Crvena Zvezda, their defense was poor. They conceded 88 points and lost the game 88-81 thanks to 13 turnovers they’ve made. The main scorers were: Brandon Paul (21 points and 2 rebounds), Nikola Milutinov (15 points and 11 rebounds) and Giorgios Printezis (14 points and 8 rebounds).
Olympiacos will have Milutinov out for this game, which is a huge blow for them and they have lost as well Kevin Punter, who signed with Crvena Zvezda. With that marquee absentee, I expect domination in the paint and also in the game for Barcelona. They will play at home and their roster is simply too much for Spanoulis and co. Barcelona will easily win this game by double-digits.
Photo: Euroleague
Bogdan Vasile Tirc
