Promitheas fighting Peristeri for a spot in the Greek Cup’s Final
The Greek Cup Semifinals will take place on Wednesday when Promitheas and Peristeri meet for a place in the final, while AEK Athens meet second division team Diagoras Driopideon. While in the second match, the winner is already known, the first match will be tougher. Both teams never win a Greek Cup in their history and with giants Panathinaikos and Olympiacos out, this may be one of the fewest shots they’ll have. Head to head Promitheas won 4 of their last meetings, including the last encounter in the league, 64-60. Who will go further?
Promitheas are in the semifinals are here because they passed big favourites Panathinaikos after a very good match. They now won their last 3 games in a row with their morale increased after 3 defeats in a row before. In their last game, they receive the visit of Brescia in Eurocup Round 5. The game was a low scoring one and very close until halftime, but in the second half, the Greek team managed to add more points to their lead and in the end, after a very poor last quarter (10-5), they managed to get a 67-56 win. That win was very important and now, before the last round, they are on the first spot with a 3-2 record. In the last round, they meet Oldenburg and they have an advantage of 11 points, after beating them at home 81-70. The main scorers in Brescia’s game were: Loukas Mavrokefalidis (15 points and 7 rebounds), Langston Hall (11 points and 4 assists) and Dimitrios Agravanis (10 points and 14 rebounds).
For Peristeri, this is not the perfect time to play a game with such a great value, because their form is bad. They won only 3 of their last 7 games, with last two games lost, against Lavrio in Greek League and against Nymburk in Basketball Champions League. Despite last loss, they managed to qualify for the next stage of BCL, so their intensity in the Czech Republic was not 100%. Nymburk played very well defensively, especially after the first quarter when they allowed Peristeri to score 31 points. In the next 3 quarters combined, they managed to score only 41 points and the final score was 84-72. The main contributors for Peristeri were: Steven Gray (18 points and 5 rebounds), Yannick Moreira (16 points and 9 rebounds) and Moses Kingsley (11 points and 11 rebounds). DeAndre Kane is their last addition, a player with 55 Euroleague games in his career. He came after an injury and is unknown his status for this game.
I expect a tough match here, but Promitheas has the first chance, especially due to their fans. Playing at home is always a big advantage in this stage and they simply can’t let this opportunity go away. If Kane plays, then Peristeri has another great foreigner in their rotation, but my pick still goes with the home team.
Photo: Eurocup
Bogdan Vasile Tirc
