Today, I will talk about the second European team to have played in this year’s edition of the Douai World Tournament: Lithuania. A team that was composed of 1990 and 1992 born players missing all their talented 91 guard players. This came up to a situation having a team dominated by inside players and totally missing the talented guard play as the 92 born players are still a bit green when it comes to play against 2 years older guys.

The main talent on the Lithuanian team is of course Donatas Motiejunas. The combination of talent, size, coordination and skills is rare in European basketball and the 2m15 tall player was clearly the reason why the NBA scouts have made the trip to Northern France. But I don’t think that they go home with any additional information on the Lithuanian. He still has potential written all over him but the doubts on his mental approach to the game have been intensified. Being in the middle of a brawl of the Lithuanian – Puerto Rico game and showing frustration throughout full games on the court is probably not the best way to improve the opinion people have on you. Whatever…

Motiejunas showed in Douai that he is more and more becoming a player that really plays inside. His three point attempts are going down and he tries to play in the low post. You can see him going for several different moves, fade away jump shots or left handed jump hooks. His hook shots look a bit strange though as he is shooting them in a bit of a throwing forward move instead of releasing the ball on its highest point. This may be a reason why his shots are always contested one despite being the tallest guy on the court.

Motiejunas needs to work on his mental approach to the game

Another position where you could see Motiejunas a lot is on the high post. He can create from that spot as he is capable of beating his opponents easily of the dribble, and this coming with either left or right hand. He finishes his drives a lot on some kind of floater and does not go that hard to the rim. He has however also the possibility to nail the jump shot from mid range or go for lightning quick passes to the back door cutters.

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It is important to see how he develops in terms of mental approach to basketball. You could see him arguing with the referees throughout the games and getting frustrated pretty easily when he does not get the calls he wants. This approach relates to his defensive game where his opponents had often open shooting possibilities as Motiejunas did not even raise the hand to defend their open looks.

Stats: 13.8ppg (41.5% FG 84.6% FT) 3.6rpg 2.8topg

A player that was quite a nice surprise for the Lithuanian team was the SF Gediminas Orelikas. By far the largest player of the squad, the forward from Pakruojis showed a very nice shooting exhibition throughout the tournament and had also quite a big impact when it came to defensive rebounding. Reports from Lithuania describe him as a bit of a lazy guy which could of course explain his devastating physical shape. He will probably never become a great athlete but he seemed to understand the game pretty well.

Orelikas reached the Final of the three point contest on Saturday

The main offensive weapon of Orelikas is his three point shot. He likes to go for some quick release from behind the arc, especially coming of a simple post screen to open him up. Not running that fast through the different screens, Orelikas knows how to get open using his body and he does not need that much of space to shoot. As he does not take the ball down before his release, he can also shoot when he has defenders running after him without the risk of getting stolen the ball. On the other hand, his deficit in athleticism prevent him from creating much of his own drive. You won’t see him going for a one dribble jump shot or playing the drive until the rim.

Orelikas did help his team a lot in defense though where he was really present in the rebound where he could use his strength to protect the ball and help his Center players in that area. Sometimes, Orelikas looks however not really concerned or too nonchalant which confirms what we heard on him from Lithuania. He came of an interesting season in NKL where he averaged 15.6ppg and 5.5rpg so that it would not be a surprise to see him next year with a bigger team in Lithuania.

Stats: 16.2ppg (55.1% FG 43.8% 3FG 13/13 FT) 4.6rpg

A player that should have been a major factor against this competition was Tautvydas Slezas. However, the Lietuvos Rytas Center could never really take over the game and saw relatively limited playing time during the tournament. He showed sparks of his talent though as he scored in different fashion, going for a powerful dunk from a high post drive or netting some kind of running hook shot. However, his limited speed handicapped him in defense and he had always some foul trouble.

A player that showed some interesting things on Sunday’s game was Tadas Padegimas. The 2m01 tall forward scored 9 points in the final quarter on good reads of the defense. He moves pretty well on the court but seems to be more of an up and down player in terms of performances when you check his stats throughout the tournament. He displays an interesting frame but looks however still pretty weak physically.

The youngest player of the Lithuanian team Dovydas Redikas had a fantastic game against the United States where he scored 31 points. He looks very elegant in what he does on the court and lots of his points come of fast breaks where he was always one of the first players to have crossed the court. He started most of the games for his team despite being born only in December 1992 and being virtually 2 and a half year younger than the rest of the team.

Redikas scored 11 out 14 against Team USA

Vytenis Cizauskas got also lots of minutes as a back-up point guard where he did a good job in setting up the team and creating open positions for his team mates through drive and dish plays most of the time. He is still pretty limited when it comes to his physical attributes but he may have a good future as a European style PG in the next years. It would not surprise me if he takes over the starting job with the U19 team this summer on the PG spot.

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Division A

• While Spain struggled one half to beat Belgium, the Greek team continued their arrogant play. After a superb start into the game and leading by around 20 points, they stopped to play and let Israel come back in the game. The Israeli even went ahead in the third quarter, but this was the alarm signal for Kosta Sloukas and his mates. They started a late rush to win the game with 22 points. While Nikos Pappas is still going very slow, it’s Kosta Sloukas who takes over the leader role of the team with his 23pts and 6asts. Vladimir Jankovic showed also his versatility and Zisis Sarikopoulos continues to score on his left handed hook shots.
• Serbia had no problem to win against Estonia while Lithuania beat Italy in a thriller. For the Italians, Nicolo Melli seems to start his European Championship a bit slower but he came up with 13pts yesterday. For his team, it looks like Pasquale Paolisso is the man that takes the responsibility while David Cournooh is still the main option from outside. For the Lithuanians, the 1991 born guard Augustas Peciukevicius excels with his aggressive play that brings him to the line often and puts the opponents under pressure. Tautvydas Slezas is doing his job in the middle with 22pts and 14rebs.
• Germany struggled again with the turnovers against Russia and have to play a Final against Ukraine today in order to advance to the next round. A Ukrainian team that had no chance against France that finally opened their defense box and allowed only 50 points. Chrislain Cairo improves and comes up with 12 and 9 while Alexis Tanghe led all scorers with 15 and 8.
• Another final will be played in the last group between Latvia and Bulgaria, both team have no wins so far. It was Toni Prostran that managed to hold of the Bulgarians in the final minutes with 4 late points to seal the deal. Turkey also needed the final seconds to win against Latvia to remain undefeated. Enes Kanter was once again dominant in the middle where nobody could stop him.

Division B

• The favorites Czech Republic and Slovenia had no problems to win their openers against the Netherlands and Sweden. Also Poland continued their winning streak and are now 2-0 after they defeated Belarus easily.
• The division also has already some surprises with the two Alpine countries Austria and Switzerland still being undefeated. Austria held off Montenegro and increased its chances to move to the Qualifying round while the Swiss also beat a former Yugoslavian country with Bosnia-Herzegovina.

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Division A

• Croatia did not have too much problems to beat a Latvian team that won’t probably repeat their Bronze medal act from last year. Mario Delas was everywhere for the Croats with 24pts, 9rebs and 3asts.
• Germany beat France in a very important game already as this group looked pretty equal. The M&Ms were on fire with Maurice Stuckey scoring 20pts in 23 minutes and Maik Zirbes going for a double-double with 22pts and 11trebs.
• In the game of the night, Greece overcame Spain in a closer game than everyone thought in the beginning. The Greeks started quickly despite a calm game of Nikos Pappas. They increased their lead and used their inside players Leonidas Kaselakis and Zisis Sarikopoulos very well against a small Spanish team. In the 2nd half, when Spain was switching to a zone, the could come back behind some good defensive efforts and a few nice plays by Alejandro Hernandez. However, it was Vladimir Jankovic and Konstantinos Papanikolaou who sealed the game in the game and a last second three pointer from mid-court by the Spanish guard could not change the result.
• Serbia, who misses all their players of Crvena Zvezda because of injury, struggled badly in their opener of the tournament and lost 83-68 against a Lithuanian team that was lead by Tautvydas Slezas and his 16pts, 13rbs, 3asts and 2blks. For Serbia, it was especially Bojan Subotic who was far away from his normal level with 2/10 shooting and 0/3 FTs.
• Bulgaria had nearly the comeback of the day after trailing by 17 in the fourth quarter. But it was not enough against the 24pts and 9rebs of Enes Kanter for the Turkish team.
• ERT World Sat broadcasts the game of the Greek U18 team. You can follow the Live Stream here from tomorrow’s game Greece-Israel starting at 18h00 CET.

Division B

• Poland had a lot of trouble to win against a English team without Ryan Richards who is not with the team because of slight injuries. Behind the 30pts of 1991 born guard Sebastian Szymanski, the Polish team won despite having their top prospect Jakub Wojciechowski fouled out in just 16 minutes. England coach Andre Alleyne told me after the game that he wasn’t happy in the way we played defense in the first half. We picked it up in the second and if we transfer that to the Portugal game tomorrow, we will be in a better position. The goal of the team is to finish better than last year (18th) and everything below 10th place would be a failure in coach Alleyne’s mind.
• Austria had a nice win to start into the tournament and put some pressure on the Netherlands. Behind the great effort of Rasid Mahalbasic who scored 28pts and had 10rebs, the team of coach Robert Langer has now chances to go to the next round. It was a very intensive game. Our team has fought very well and we stuck together. We have overpowered the Dutch but we can improve, told the coach after the game to the press.
• Sweden managed to beat Bosnia-Herzegovina behind 21pts in 24 minutes of Omar Zaghden. The Swedish PF got some nice support from his outside scorers Andreas Person and Christopher Czerapowicz who both were in double figures. The Bosnian team relied a bit too much on Dino Hodzic who had to do it all.
• Finland outscored Hungary in the second quarter 30-14 to go for their first win. A surprising performance by the Kouvot SF Matti Nuutinen with 22pts and 10rebs and the awaited scoring efforts of Sasu Salin and Roopi Ahonen were enough to give the Hungarians their first loss.
• One of the tournament favorites Slovenia will start their run for Division A tomorrow when they will play against the other strong team of their group Sweden.

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