There are no empires
Euroleague beauty has this season. The truth? As in every season, since the beginning of the current format. This season, the power is reflected in the quality of the teams below the first tier, those who impressed much less in the 2019/20 season, which never came to an end. The thing is, things are completely different when it comes to the ones at the top. 21 rounds into the season, and it must be clear to everyone that there is no Super Tim in the area, one that is one rank or higher above them all. There are some great teams, like CSKA or Barcelona, but their basketball is humane and loss-making. And in any case, they are all within one injury distance (Sharas’ Davis, for example), from being exposed to almost any second-tier rival in the world.
Real Madrid, in any case, is a team that plays great basketball. Which includes Eddie Tavares, one of the highest quality and most significant players in the league. Apart from that, if one breaks down for a moment the intelligence and defensive abilities and refers only to net offensive talent, one gets a staff that does not exceed a significant part of the other teams. Which can be looked at in the white of the eyes, as the Red Star did a few days ago, and as it did, with the help of considerable talent, Maccabi Tel Aviv yesterday.
And the meaning? When it is formed at the end of the leading eighth year, unlike quite a few previous seasons, certainly when the audience’s affairs are still unclear, it is possible to make a Final Four from anywhere, against (almost) any opponent. Even if your team is currently playing mediocre basketball. Even if it currently holds a balanced, borderline or even negative balance.
Everything written so far is not meant to diminish the Yellows’ beautiful victory yesterday. The opposite is true, he comes to say that Maccabi Tel Aviv is far from being a big team that plays great basketball, but in a season like this, where many truths we knew in the past or got used to in the past do not necessarily catch, strange things can happen, to Maccabi Tel Aviv and other teams, for better or for worse.
The deeper
The early delay the host got into yesterday did her only good, mainly because he forced Yannis Sapropoulos to go early, and especially deep, into his bench. How early? One minute and twenty-five seconds from the start, Angelo Cloiaro came out in favor of Yuval Sussman. The reason, by the way, is that Pablo Lasso surprised him when he did not start with a thin Gabriel in the top five – what was planned to be the defensive matchup. Two minutes and twenty-four seconds inside, and Elijah Bryant also made way for Tyler Dorsey. Until the end of this quarter, in which Maccabi Tel Aviv was unable to buy any defensive stoppage in the face of its opponent’s perfect attack, they held it in the 9-point game that the guard created himself and himself.
Now add into this matter John Dibertolomeo, who went into minus 9 towards the end of the first quarter and helped lead a 0:13 run to get the air back to the lungs of Deri Yad Eliyahu, Plus Oz Blazer and especially Othello Hunter, and we will understand that Sapropoulos’ second and secondary lineup Him to life and kept him alive, in a half that could have ended in a Madrid knockout.
Last night, Maccabi Tel Aviv’s bench produced 52 points, almost twice as much as the opposite bench did. And suddenly, under the auspices of Tyler Dorsey’s shelling, we felt – almost for the first time this season – that the numerical depth of the Israeli champion is also a quality depth.
This stability is for the weak
25
8
1
30
not to worry. This is not the secret code for the nuclear suitcase that former President Trump carried with him on his way to Florida. These are the points data scored by Tyler Dorsey in his last four Euroleague games. 25 against Alba Berlin, 30 yesterday against Real Madrid. 8 + 1 on the way. Stable, no? Nice, no?
And if this seems frenetic to you, then what do you think about the man’s efficiency index in those games?
27
0
-2
36
And not that this is the first time this season or at all, but a pattern that characterizes the man with the Greek passport, who once mistakenly thought he was entitled to a blue ID card by virtue of the amendment to the Law of Return (and he is not). It blooms occasionally, with large and significant breaks between blooms and blooms. Tyler Dorsey is a fucking scorer. One who owes the ball in his hands. One that when it feels like it’s happening, then it’s going biggie (wait, both fucking and biggie in the same paragraph? I’ll try to relax from now on). One on his back should ride when it happens. And believe it or not, that same Dorsey ride last night was mostly on the back of Eddie Tavares, one who is not ridden.
Because on the face of it, at least in theory, it makes sense to think that a tall man as tall as the man from Cape Verde would be a defensive burden, no? Like Ante Žižić like that. This theory, for those wondering, has not applied too much to Tavares since joining Real and the Euroleague. But occasionally, quite rarely, they manage to punish him during pick-and-roll moves, and Dorsey was the punishing man yesterday.
Here, in the first quarter, Pick and Roll Dorsey beat Žižić who mixed the extremely long legs of Tavares – who could not go out to Dorsey, who knocked Trita on.
via GIPHY
And here too Pick & Roll. This time, with a delayed block (DELAY SCREEN) and an early Sussman on Tavares, to extend and delay his way to help on Dorsey. So Tavares came in at the end and really tried, but this time too he snatched a three inside his face.
via GIPHY
Did you like the blocking? So this time take Bryant’s DELAY SCREEN on Tavares. If the giant managed to get to Dorsey and even jump in front of him, then a great delivery from the Yellow Guard, through the floor, found Hunter and the ring, with one of the three nice assists that Dorsey had yesterday.
via GIPHY
This is usually the time when trying to explain that scoring is good, but stability is most important. Because you know, a good player is measured over time and blah blah blah. The thing is, stability is the wrong word. A player who scores well over time is not a stable player, but an excellent player. A talented Tyler Dorsey scorer, who can sometimes go insane and be unstoppable. Tyler Dorsey is a good player. Tyler Dorsey, unless he proves otherwise, is far from an excellent player.
Win games with Wilbkin (and Dorsey)
Everyone already knows the inverse relationship between points scored by the yellow franchise player and victories. Everyone already knows that usually this season, Wilbkin who takes on at the end of games = Wilbkin who loses games. No yesterday, and the truth is that around three minutes to the end, it seemed like a game repeating the familiar script: Wilbkin started his endless dribbling dances, this time – luckily – somehow managed to squeeze in two offenses that prevented broken attacks that end in tears.
Wilbkin provided his main and very important consideration for victory in the attacks at the end, precisely when he is at the ball, precisely when he serves as bait, precisely when he performs other actions. Demonstrate? We will demonstrate.
37 seconds to the end of the game, and the ball was put below the baseline. Wilbkin was given a graded block by Cloiaro and Žižić, and all Real players adjusted themselves to a move that would result in Wilbkin getting and throwing. Jeffrey Taylor tried to prevent, Dek and Tavares were just busy with him. Meanwhile, while Wilbkin (intentionally or unintentionally) served as the perfect bait, the color became available and allowed a penetration into the basket of the fiery Dorsey, who took Laprobitola for a trip around the city of Tel Aviv, to the basket and Paul.
via GIPHY
Nice? Nice. And now for a move that kind of closes interest. Against the Spanish rival, Maccabi Tel Aviv ran an exercise called a Spanish pick and roll. I.e. a move in which the player with the ball (Dorsey) runs a pick and roll (with Hunter). At the same time, another guard (Wilbkin) produces a back block on the blocker. Do not panic please, it is not very complicated. The principle in this case, in practice, is similar to the previous move, because here too they went for Dorsey, and here too they used Wilbkin’s deterrent to release Dorsey for a shot. Because when Wilbkin is the one putting down the back block, he forces two guards (Taylor and Tavares) to mess with him and the hunter moving toward the ring. All this is possible for Dorsey, time and place to work in front of Provitola, and if this shot seems difficult to you, then you do not know Tyler Dorsey, and certainly not yesterday’s Tyler Dorsey.
via GIPHY
Obviously That you can win games with Scotty Wilbkin. He has proven this time and time again in the past, and will prove it time and time again in the near and distant future. One can definitely win when Wilbkin takes the ball, moves everyone, and knocks treads in his opponent’s face. But it can also be done in various forms, which are not based only on dribbles and prayer to the merciful and nerdy God. Yesterday was a good example of this. I wonder what will happen at the next opportunity.
But wait. Let’s go back a bit, because there were also bad moments of basketball yesterday, in the 24 minutes that Wilbkin played. Includes a confused and problematic attack in the early stages of the game. Because if this song, in this course, seems familiar to you, it’s just because that same dribble remains.
via GIPHY
And if this song, through Zizic’s back, seems painful to you, it’s just because there’s no reason for him to get excited, on the way to another move that ends in a disappointing ball loss.
via GIPHY
But to Wilbkin’s credit, he insisted much less yesterday and picked up just 5 shots. At the same time, he served much more as a coordinator, delivering 8 assists compared to losing a single ball, which is excellent. Here’s one nice assist, which went from the man who was coordinator yesterday, to the dorsi who was Wilbkin yesterday.
via GIPHY
Lasso’s basketball
Pablo Lasso is an excellent basketball coach. At the tactical level, at the level of his ability to manage big teams and huge egos, and more or less in every other aspect that is required of a coach who stands on the lines of a club like Real Madrid. Even yesterday, from the relatively limited staff at his disposal, the former coordinator managed to produce many magical moments. Because when the Spaniards’ attacking game works, it is nothing short of happy. Through the players moving at a dizzying pace from side to side, through the great team coordination, through the confidence he manages to instill in all kinds of players that confidence should be far away from.
For example, 20-year-old Carlos Allussen, who was the opening coordinator of the White Empire yesterday. For example, Alberto Abalda, a bench player in Valencia, who came to Real as a man who was supposed to succeed the great Rudy Fernandez, but became an opening guard (and excellent) already in his first season.
This Habalda finished the first quarter with 5 assists, and this is a quarter in which Madrid scored 100% in 2-point shots, yes? He spent, immediately afterwards, most of the entire second quarter on the bench. Fabian Kozer, for example, played last night only in the third quarter, and Trey Tompkins, the guest’s best player yesterday, in a game in which he scored 8 threes and scored 4 of them and a total of 20 plus 4 assists (no loss) – he actually swung between bench and field in the decisive minutes And of all the coordinators left in Lasso’s squad, it was Jesse Carroll who led the ball, and lost the ball, in the last attack.
Pablo Lasso is an excellent basketball coach. With a method that has proven itself time and time again. That to the naked, and incomprehensible eyes, sometimes looks a little strange.
5 minutes from hell
In this Pablo Lasso basketball, he won yesterday about five minutes from the hell made by Alex Tios, who returned for the first time in a while to the place that was his home. As soon as he entered, under the auspices of the surrounding silence and in full coordination with people who, shall we say, are close to the yellow club, he heard an insulting and accurate trash talk from the people sitting in the stands opposite. People who know how the man tends to react sometimes when it’s a little difficult for him. And yesterday? It was very difficult for him. Tios came into the game in the second quarter, as an integral part of Lasso’s (shocking) replacement squad, which also included Osman Garuba as a front-line teammate.
There was not a single move that managed to fly, neither on offense nor on defense. For example here: In this exercise, Tios is supposed to return the ball to Gabriel Dek, go downstairs and arrange a block for someone called Jesse Carroll. But Tios forgot where he came from and where he was going, and instead of blocking the best pure slingshot in the history of the old continent, he got stuck in color. He then improvised some backhand move to the basket in front of Blazer, adding an offense for a felony.
via GIPHY
Or here, on the side where it is customary to save, when Tios forgot where they stand in defensive care in front of Dorsey’s pick and roll the Hunter.
via GIPHY
5:38 minutes Alex Tios stayed on the field yesterday, which he finished with a negative efficiency index (minus 4) and a plus-minus negative index (minus 8). In the summer, Real Madrid could have signed a replacement center for Tavares, but chose not to do so. After the injury of Anthony Randolph, in position number 4, Real Madrid could have signed 4 under him or 5 substitutes. Passport matters sent her looking for someone who is not American, and so an Israeli like Tios fished for her, who in the very near future will have to give her back for the game from last night. Because if we admit the truth, then since 18.5.14, in the same final in Milan, Alex Tios has not helped Maccabi Tel Aviv so much to beat Real Madrid.
Three points to go
1. Protection. It’s hard to talk about a quality defensive game on an evening where 84 points are scored. But Maccabi Tel Aviv managed to hold its rival below 20 in both doubles quarters. In the second quarter, where it absorbed 13, the defensive success can be attributed mainly to the problematic lineup on the other side. In the fourth quarter, from the other side, all the credit should go to whoever fought on the hardwood and led from the lines.
2. Hunter or Žižić? This is the stage, usually, where the usual compliments come to the hunter. The man who is Maccabi Tel Aviv’s defensive player. But not this time. Othello Hunter had a good attacking play, which he finished with 11 points on a good percentage, and almost, but really almost, did not find himself in situations where Tavares’ shadow caused him to lose or miss. But defensively, it turns out, there are bad days even for Hunter, who ate points on his head too many pick and roll moves yesterday, who failed to seal the paint in situations where he is used to dismantling the opponent. Therefore, it is no coincidence that in quite a few of the important minutes yesterday, we actually got Zizic on the floor, and not just on offense.
3. A week piece in the doorway. Fenerbahce out on Tuesday, Andulo Zero at home on Thursday. The first, before playing today against CSKA, with 10 victories (like Maccabi). The second, after a loss to Zenit, with 11. Despite this, both are in a relatively good period and in an improving trend, like Maccabi. That every loss = double loss and bundled troubles in a state of possible equality.Two victories, from the other side, and Haida celebrations.The short, is going to be great fun, coming from Disco Snoopy.
via GIPHY