So, here we are — the EuroLeague championship game is finally here. We will see a final battle between Anadolu Efes Istanbul and CSKA Moscow. Semi-finals of Euroleague were a little bit surprising and because of that we have what to talk about, so please review our thoughts here below.
Anadolu Efes Istanbul
Anadolu is on fire and managed to beat Fenerbahce. This was a surprising win because Efes was like underdogs in this matchup. However, they beat Fener by 19 points and now we are going to see them in the finals.
Anadolu made their way through Fener by hitting many threes. This was the main reason why they won. The ball was moving, a few players stepped up and made their fair share of points, all 5 Efes’ players crashed the offensive board and managed to grab many rebounds on this end of the floor. It looked like Efes was more passionate and “hungrier” for the win.
Huge boost for Anadolu was great performances by their main guards — Vasilje Micic and Shane Larkin. They combined for 55 points, both were hitting very tough shots and led their team by a great example. Overall, these players are having a great season. And the best think about Vasilje and Shane is that they are consistent. You need that consistency if you want to win the championship.
Anadolu has no injured players.
Efes’ best players in the semi-final: Shane Larkin (30pts, 7rebs, 7ass, 2stls), Vasilje Micic (25pts, 5rebs) and Bryant Dunston (9pts, 10rebs).
CSKA Moscow
CSKA is coming after a hard-fought win against Real Madrid. Finally, they made it to the championship as they failed to do that multiple times, in the past. But here we are — CSKA has proven themselves in the last game and the “Red Army” is ready to show that they are the best team in Europe.
So in the last game, CSKA’s defense was not very good. They allowed 90 points and this is not a good result if you want to win. But, despite 14 points deficit in the 3rd quarter they managed to come back to the game and in the end, they won it. It was because of their great offense. High basketball IQ and individual offensive skillset made the difference for Moscow.
The team was led mainly led by 3 players. Nando De Colo, Sergio Rodrigues and Will Clyburn combined for 64 points. They were the main men that hit the clutch shots in late game situations. Everyone was helping each other and this made up for a great result.
CSKA has no injured players.
Moscow’s best players in the semi-final: Nando De Colo (23pts, 4rebs, 2ass), Sergio Rodriguez (23pts, 4ass), Will Clyburn (18pts, 5rebs).
Anadolu Efes vs CSKA Moscow H2H
So this is a final that probably very few people expected. It is said that defense wins championships, but here we see two teams that hate defense battling for the title. This is going to be a resultative, beautiful game and the winner is more or less unpredictable. I expect to see many runs, but the opposing team should be coming back with their own run. It is going to be high-pace basketball.
Efes and CSKA are very similar teams. They both rely on their offensive leaders and the biggest question is their performance. The team will perform as good as team’s leaders will. This is that kind of game that every loose ball, every turnover, every single rebound, and mini-battle is going to decide a winner. I wish you a good game and let the best win it all!
Article Image Taken from https://www.euroleague.net/main/results/showgame?gamecode=29&seasoncode=E2017#!report