Promitheas, from BasketballCL to Eurocup
Promitheas, from BasketballCL to Eurocup
My attention turns today to one of the most beautiful stories from today`s basketball, Promitheas Patras. They managed to promote league by league in successive years until 2016 when they reached the first division. In the first year, they finished on the 9th place, then in the 2017-2018 season on 3rd place and last season on 4th place. Last season in the play-offs they were stopped only by Panathinaikos in the Finals. They lost the final by 3-0 but won the appreciation of many basketball fans. Now, let`s see what changes they made for their first-ever European cup participation.
This summer the club parted ways with some players and here I can name Terell Parks, Rion Brown, Tony Meier, Christos Saloustros and Nikos Gkikas. In exchange, they added five new and interesting players. I will start with the Greek players. They brought a former Euroleague champion, Georgios Bogris (30 years-old, 2.10m, C). He played last two seasons with Olympiacos and was a decent back-up player in 40 Euroleague games. He also played 4 years in EuroCup with four different teams and he won the first edition of the Basketball Champions League with Tenerife, before joining Olympiacos. He`s a very good addition and will help Patras in the paint. The second Greek player brought is Dimitris Agravanis (24 years-old, 2.08m, F) also from Olympiacos. He spent the last six seasons there. He played in over 70 Euroleague games, but in last two years, due to some injuries, he played in only 9 games. If he manages to keep away from injuries he can grow and continue his development because he`s only 24.
Three Americans players are the new acquisitions of Promitheas. First, Chris Babb (29 years-old, 1.95m, G) from Bahcesehir Istanbul. He averaged 5.8 points and 2.7 rebounds in 16 Turkish games last season. He has some experience in EuroCup because he played with Lokomotiv Kuban in 2017-2018 and reached the finals. He averaged 8.3 points and 2.4 rebounds in 20 games. The second American player brought is Robert Lowery (31 years-old, 1.88m, G). He came from Torun, where, in 43 league games, he averaged 12.8 points, 3.7 rebounds and 6.4 assists. He helped his team reaching the Polish finals. He`s a very good scorer and will add some offensive quality to Promitheas`s roster. Last but not least is Chase Fieler (27 years-old, 2.03, F). He came from Oostende, where last season he averaged 10.1 points, 3.5 rebounds and 2.5 assists in Basketball Champions League. He`s a versatile player on both ends of the floor.
This season will be an interesting one for Promitheas fans. They have the chance to see some good European clubs because their team were drawn in the Group A of EuroCup alongside Ulm, Monaco, Andorra, Bologna and Maccabi Rishon. They will try to defend the home ground every match, but some wins away will be needed in order to qualify in Top16.
Photo credit: championsleague.basketball
Bogdan Vasile Tirc
Promitheas, from BasketballCL to Eurocup
