Umana Venezia will host the disappointing Armani Milano
A big derby will take place in the round 13 of Legabasket where Venezia will host Milano in a very interesting duel between two teams with big ambitions this season. Both teams played in European competition this week, so let’s see the results and who are more prepared for this game.
The season for Venezia is a little bit in contrast because they play very well in Eurocup where they lead their group and secured the qualification for the next stage, while in Seria A they have some problems, having until now 5 wins and 6 defeats from 11 matches. They need to recover and start winning some games because their aim is to get a top-4 place in the regular season to have the home-court advantage in the play-offs. Looking at their roster, if they don’t complete that task will be kind of disappointing. On Tuesday, they travel to France were they meet Limoges in a game where they secured the first place in the group after a 78-71 victory. They used 10 players in the game, with at least 10 minutes on the court each and everybody brought some contribution. The top performers where: Mitchell Watt (16 points and 7 rebounds), Michael Bramos (13 points and 5 rebounds) and Ariel Filloy (12 points and 3 rebounds).
For Olimpia Milano, things are completely different. In Seria A they are now in the second place, behind Virtus Bologna with an 8-4 record, but in Euroleague, after a 7-2 record, they are now on a 4-defeats run. That run must be stopped because they are now on the 8th place and there are a lot of teams that will fight for a play-off place in this year’s Euroleague. In the last game, they travelled to France, where they meet and lost to ASVEL Lyon 89-82. They played a good game but lost the rebounds battle which gave Lyon more attempts from the field and there the difference was made. In the third quarter, Lyon simply smashed Milano with 16 points, 32-16, after a 14-2 score in the rebounds stats column. For Milano, the main contributors were: Luis Scola (14 points, 3 rebounds and 3 assists), Sergio Rodriguez (13 points and 10 assists), and Kaleb Tarczewski (12 points and 4 rebounds).
In the last season, both teams won the away games, with Milano recording an 84-81 win on Venezia’s home soil. Because Milano had only 2 days rest to Venezia’s 5, it will be very hard to get the win like last year.
Photo: Eurocup
Bogdan Vasile Tirc
