Olympiakos strolled to an 18-point triumph against Euroleague holder Fenerbahce at Friday’s semifinal, to secure its place in Sunday’s trophy game at the Athens Final Four, in front of over 12,000 ecstatic Greek fans at the Telekom Center Athens.
The 79-61 result reveals the extent of the Greek champion’s dominance in the first semifinal, and renders the team of coach Giorgos Bartzokas the favorite for the final, where the Reds will seek their fourth European title.
The first Final Four hosted in the Greek capital in 19 years sports one Greek representative, and the Reds played this semi against last year’s winner enjoying huge support from their fans.
They powered into the game with 12 unanswered points, showing the Istanbul team who the boss of the game was. Much as Fener tried to reduce its arrears, the Greeks kept pulling away, advancing by nine at half-time (33-24) and expanding that lead to 20, with another unanswered 11 points at the start of the second half (44-24).
The outgoing champions managed to cut their distance to nine on two occasions, but this was as close as they could get, since the best defense of the Euroleague’s regular season proved unable to stop the best offense.
With a 22% rate in triples, Fenerbahce stood no chance against its high-scoring rival, that also dominated rebounds (43-34).
Alec Peters is not usually the player to rise to the big occasion, but this time he paced the Reds with 17 points, ahead of Sasha Vezenkov with 16 and Tyler Dorsey with 15. Nikola Milutinov was precious, though, for Olympiakos, with his 13 rebounds and six points. Tarik Biberovic made 17 for Fenerbahce.
Olympiakos will face Real Madrid in the final, after the latter defeated Valencia 105-90 in the other semifinal on Friday night.
