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This text will be published soon. Details

This text will be published soon. Details

This text will be published soon. Details

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Khimki won't be even close to the team they were the last few seasons. Their current roster cannot be compared to the previous ones. Coach Bartzokas acquired players like Markovic, Jenkins, Anderson and Honeycutt who are all great defenders. It's no wonder Khimki allowed 55 and 64 points in two VTB league games. Last season they beat Riga away 104-90 and now 104-64.
They had some unproductive games in preseason against defensively powerful teams like Panathinaikos, Brose, Fenerbahce. Tehy are now to face the beat defense of the ACB league that acquired a defense expert to be in charge. Valencia opened with a lot of good games on the defensive end. The 69-63 Supercup final against Granca is one of them. Granca later played Zaragoza at 200 points, Baskonia over 100 home and 190 Zenit the other day. H2h games from last season are not relevant since Khimki have just one important player from that team (Sved), while Pullen, Rowland, Brown, Hummel left. Details

There aren't many games we can look at here, but it is obvious that Fuenlabrada are playing different than last season, with more set attacks, much better and more aggressive defense with several new quality players.
At home they limited Bilbao to under 70, at Andorra, who are one of the most offensive teams at home, they had 78-68 with two and a half minutes left, and then they made some stupid mistakes, Andorra hit everything and they went into overtime (83-83). Regardless of the outcome, that over is not a minus, but a proof in Fuenlabrada's favor. Last season they conceded 96 here, Andorra are not looking good defensively and they cannot be put in the same sentence with Unicaja.
Plaza's defense has been the best in ACB League for years, they now have a difficult away game and this cannot go up to 160 points in these circumstances. At Murcia they played 74-64, and in my estimate, Murcia and Fuenlabrada can be put in the same sentence. Details

Totas qualified for last season's play-off in the last round, got a wild card for the Eurocup, their sponsors Fiat probably gave them a financial injection so they acquired Paunic, Morgan, Pierrie, Owens and Kadji. They are a good team on paper, but so far only a group of individuals. Their crucial players are still last year's key players, Mejia and Crocker, while Micic's departure is a big handicap. They lost their last pre-season game 88-81 to Eskisehir, Efes defeated them 88-67, Lokomotiv 84-70, they lost to Novgorod (who lost to Belgians in the Champions League), then to Milan, while they defeated only Gaziantep, Sakariya and Aris.
On the other side we have Darussafaka where David Blatt put together a team of hungry players, who have become a real team over the Summer and who have impressed me in every way. I watched their tournament in Moscow against CSKA and Panathinaikos, and their last pre-season game against Efes. They lost to CSKA by a basket or two, the next day defeated Panathinaikos and later Efes, so they are at the level of three Euroleague teams. Before that they defeated Zenit, Promitheas and Istanbul IBB.
Blatt has put together an aggressive team, I haven't seen something like that even in Zvezda in their best days with Radonjic. They are at the same time very fast, offensively powerful, and Blatt also pointed out that they will be physically very strong and athletic.
They kept Wilbekin and good Turkish youngsters, while Kidd, Cummings,Sant-Ross, Johnson, Bell and Eric might not be well known, but Blatt fit them in great and we will see a much more dangerous Darussafaka than last year. Details

Granca were great for these types of handicaps at home last season: Murcia +10, Estudiantes +18, Barca +13, Manresa +19, Obradoiro +34, Joventut +18, Baskonia +13, Betis +20, Fuenlabrada +51..., with only one minus, +4 against Zaragoza who came a few days after a long trip to Lithuania where they defeated Lietkabelis by 20. Later in the season they won at Zaragoza by 45. This year's Granca are not much weaker than last year's, if at all. We can confirm that with 10 point difference against Real in the Supercup. We should point out that they had quality pre-season, with almost complete roster, without injuries, and the new acquisitions proved to be great choices. Gipuzkao are a team that will fight the relegation battle, they have reinforced their roster with a few experienced players (Norel, Van Lacke), a couple of Americans, but they are still far from Granca's level. In the pre-season they played against teams that did not qualify for the ACB play-off last season, they parried them well, but that cannot be relevant for this game. With that, their camp is more focused on Wednesday and a more important game against Betis at home, coach Fisac said that they are trying to get Chery ready for that game, he won't play today. Since they lack width anyway, I doubt they can stay under 15 here. Details

The market reacted to injuries at Baskonia and from a potentially even game, we have an unrealistic handicap. As if decimated Baskonia were facing CSKA in Moscow in April. And it completely different.
BArcelona are a new team, their preseason was shorter because many players were at the Eurobasket, and Ribas was injured, and now Oriola and maybe Tomic are out, with Claver who has been out a while, and Oriole who is back after 8 months and he will not play over 15 minutes. So we are left with Presseym Huertel, Koponen, Navarro, Sanders, Seraphin, Vezenkov... In my opinion they will fight for the play-off.
They played their last friendly without Tomic, Claver and Oriola, with minimal playing time for Ribas, and barely managed to defeat Murcia 72-70.
On the other side we have Baskonia whose biggest acquisitions are point guards Granger and Heurtas, whom the new coach Prigioni will often use together on the court. McRae's injury made them acquire Janning, who is a great guard, able to play against Koponen or Navarro in defense, and the mentioned duo can guard Pressey and HUertel easily (Granger played with him in Efes last season). Barca could create a difference at the number four, because Sengelia and Garino are out, But I am not sure that Vezenkov and Sanders are material against which Prigioni cannot defend against. This Baskonia demolished Hapoel in their last pre-season game (Sengelija injured and played only 10 minutes) and left a much better impression than Barcelona against Murcia.
I am convinced that Baskonia will play an even game, I also personally bet on Barca's win. Details

Magdeburg lost three games so far, to undefeated Hannover and Fuchse, and at Kiel. They had a 20-14 lead at Hannover, 24-18 at Kiel, they couldn't hold it until the end, but Minden won't be able to keep up with them. Minden have only one relevant away game so far, they lost by 15 at Lowen. Last season they regularly lost by over 5 away - Magdeburg 12, Fuchse 10, Goppingen 10, Melsungen 6, Flensburg 7, Hannover 8, and the only thing standing our is the draw at Kiel, but even Stuttgart and Balingen were close to winning points at Kiel, so Kiel might not be a good comparison.
This-year's Minden are not stronger than last season, and Magdeburg will be fired up after their latest failures and they will win this for sure. So far at home they had wins by 8 against Stuttgart and Huttenberg, by 4 against Friesenheim, and Stuttgart and Huttenber left a much better impression so far than Minden. Details

Wetzlar are far from last season's level. Home slips against Huttenberg and Minden clearly show problems with their game. They are now without top playmaker Mirkulovski and key defender Klesniks, while Weber left. That is why they don't stand a chance in this game.
Kiel are faced with a wall. They lost two league games and meet Lowen next round away. The stakes are higher and there can be no mistakes today. They point out that they still remember the defeat from last season and apart from having Weber and Mikulovski back then, that was the second game in 48 hours for Kiel.
Kiel lost just one game to Wetzlar out of last 29. They did rather well in defense against PSG and Leipzig and given the circumstances, they will win this easily, by at least 4-5 goals. Wetzlar's offense is so helpless today that Kiel's defense won't have problems making up for all of their offensive struggles. Details

Stuttgart do not have players that could set up a fast pace at the moment. This will be a meeting between two direct rivals that will be decided by defense.
The home team are without numerous important back players but they can have a good defense and rely on Bitter. The visitors are defensively very stable and have a great goal keeper. They limited Lemgo to 9 goals in the first half and 21 goal at FT last round.
Looking at what Stuttgart did last season against teams that fount to avoid relegation just like them, we see a pattern emerging: Balingen home 25-21, away 19-23; Coburg home 26-20, away 26-23, Bergischer home 26-24,
away 35-26 (HT -, Bergischer played 7 on 6 later on). Those are three teams that were relegated but we can add these results too: Gummersbach home 23-21, away 20-27, Lemgo home 30-29, away 24-24.
Out of 10 games against direct rivals, we have only one that was really an over (the home game with Lemgo, who were much faster last season).
The visitors, on the other hand, have Lemgo in preseason 53, Lemgo last round 45, Coburg 46 in preseason, Gummersbach 49, Huttenberg 45. I think this will be another game that will be decided at 25. Details

Mors were a hit last season, but they have -20 in two games against Skjern. Mors will not be a sensation this season, and their quality is close to last year's, maybe lower. One of their top players left to Skjern (pivot Cichosz), and Skjern are now the favorites to win the title, after they acquired Konradsson, Eggert, Stenbacken... Mors defeated weak Tonder in the first round, and then lost to Midtjylland at home.
In the pre-season they have +4 against Midtjylland, -4 and -8 to Norwegian Drammen, +1 against second division side Skive and +1 against Holstebro. Skjern seem like they a level above. After two consecutive draws and disappointment with their performances, and as an intro to the Champions League, and I am sure they will take it all out on Mors and the result could be the same as last season. Skjern recently defeated Aalborg by 10 in the SuperCup, and in pre-season they have a win by 4 at Flensburg, Ribe by 7, Skanderborg by 13, Lemvig by 9 and Midtjylland by 5...
Anything under 7-8 would be a surprise...
Another good is Skjern over 30. Details

Kolding played 2 serious games in pre-seson, Winterthur at 50 goals, Aix at 49. All other games were mainly blow-outs, but they defeated Cocks Finland by 15 and ended at 53, and they defeated second division side Otterup by 9 and it ended at 53.
From the first round they played at 52 against fast and strong Holstebro, and they went up to 59 in the falling apart at Arhus.
Coach pointed out that their focus is on defense, they lack the strength for running and insisting on transition as much as he would like it, because of a virus they supposedly brought from Bosnia and which prevented pivot Overbu and right-back Kristiansen from training full time. Both of them played in Aarhus, so they are expected today as well.
Aalborg are not the same team without Sagosen, we have seen that so far in the season. After the pre-season, where they mostly faced German teams, they have 50 goals against Kiel, 43 against Sonderjyske,, and 44 against Skjern in the Supercup, 48 at Midtjylland. The loss at BSV with 36 conceded goals is not relevant, neither are the 33-29 against newcomers Nordsjaelland. It was 12-11 at halftime, they upped the pace in the second half, but Nordsjaelland's back line is much younger and faster than Stenmalm - Spellerberg-Kristiansen, which we will watch today.
Because of the circumstances and everything I wrote, this is not a game for 55 goals, in my opinion. Details

Melsungen have struggled in the first games of the season, and I expect them to struggle even more here, and they will not get out of this one. Without brothers Muller and probably Danner, they cannot set a good defense, which would be felt against much weaker teams, let alone one of the main title favorites.
Kiel slipped up in the previous round, they will give their best here. Last season, when they were weaker, they had a 10 goal lead by halftime here. I think this game will be decided early. I am not giving many chances to this Melsungen. Details

The Greek media have a consensus about this game being the most important one. It seems like their team tanked yesterday to avoid Spain in QFs. They will probably face Lithuania and then an easier opponent and clearly feel like Lithuania are easier opponents than Spain.
That is why they didn't do their best yesterday but they will today. Who ever loses this will be knocked out. I'll try to avoid the potential close finish and overtime so I'll go with the first half here after the under at Poland against Finland didn't work out. Greece have 70 points from the first game with Iceland, they fell apart with France and then played Slovenia at 65 points. They have three games from a tournament in Greece and three unders: Georgia 70, Italy 64, Serbia 73. Poland aren't great in offense, they played France at 60 by half time yesterday, Finland at 68, Iceland at 70 before that. They only had an over with Slovenia. Their tactics today will probably be to case problems for Greece through small ball but Greece should easily control their positions 1-3.
This is a very specific game and there can be no holding back. Greece can only rely on defense here and they will not fail. If you have a LIVE option, Poland at 36,5 in the first half is also good. Details

I don't understand how we could see 160 points here. These teams played in Poland at 151 point last season and at 143 at EC two years ago. This is a very important game. Poland played Slovenia at 171 and Iceland at 152 with 55 in the last quarter.
Finland played France at 148, Slovenia at 159 with unreal 94 in the first half and 65 in the second. The h2h at EC from two seasons ago is very relevant since the teams are 90 percent unchanged. Last EC for Finland: Serbia 175, Bosnia 147, Poland 143, Russia 160, Israel 145, France 162.

Last EC for Poland: 161 Russia, 146 Spain, 143 Finland, 148 Israel, 135 France, 132 Bosnia. AT World Championship in Spain: New Zealand 132, Turkey 150 with overtime, 135 France and 132 Bosnia.

Poland have overs in irrelevant test games. They have many players who are lead by defense-oriented coaches in the clubs and will stand up to the Finnish game style. I don't see a game this important going over 160. Details

Lubbecke played Flensburg and Kiel which doesn't mean much here. They displayed offensive problems which cannot be dealt with in two days. That is why they are expect to focus on tough defense so the 53,5 has great value.
The fast-paced Leipzig were recently here with a few German internationals and the margin was at 53,5 or 52,5 even. Lubbecke simply cannot do what Leipzig can.
Minden and Lubbecke played a test game this summer (Minden won 26-25 away). Last season Minden won 23-22 in the Cup and Lubbecke won a friendly last summer 26-24. These teams are great rivals, Lubbecke are not good in offense. Given all that, I don't see this going at 55 or over. Details