Today we continue our review of the players from the Adidas Eurocamp in Treviso with a few additional names that we are thinking are worth to be mentioned.

Nihad Dedovic – SG – 1m97 – 1990

The Bosnian guard had one of the fastest shot releases of the whole camp. The release is so quick that it looks like he does not really prepare his shot. But he needs to fire the ball that quickly as he has the ball a bit before his face when taking the shot and therefore is always at risk of being blocked in his attempts. He likes to come of the screens and immediately fire the ball from any distance. Coming of the curl on the weak-side and receiving the diagonal pass is one of the situations in which Dedovic excels and scores with high percentages.

Additionally, he is very active on defense with his hands and steals quite a few balls. Dedovic is doing a nice job on the fast break as he can accelerate nicely and score the layup with the foul as he is a correct athlete. A first season on the ACB level with regular playing time behind him, the Bosnian will now make the next step forward and knowing that he came back from a injury recently, there are some nice things ahead for him in the next years. It may not be enough for NBA level but we should see him play on Euroleague level in a few years time.

Josep Franch – PG – 1m87 – 1991

Josep Franch played a very interesting camp and is considered already as the future PG of Joventut Badalona. The fast Spaniard broke the defenses on multiple occasion with his hesitation moves or accelerations and was not afraid at all to go against the big guys to score on a multitude of different underhand lay-ups. He looked to be more of a scoring guard in the camp as he did not particularly show amazing passing skills and mostly went for his own options.

Pietro Aradori – SG – 1m93 – Auto-Eligible – 1988

The Italian guard had an up-and-down camp and showed that he is not really NBA material at the moment. Aradori had some limits when it came to the NBA three-point line as his shot did not look regular when going for an attempt from that distance. Athletically, he is not quick enough to defend SGs despite correct leaping abilities for a European player. His skill set is a lot more adapted to European basketball and he will certainly do a lot of damage in the next years. With his scoring skills and understanding, Aradori will probably be among the major scorers for the next years in European basketball.

Dairis Bertans – PG/SG – 1m93 – 1989

The Latvian guard showed an interesting scoring talent in Treviso combined with good athletic abilities. More of a scoring guard than a pure play maker, Bertans has already some high-level experience due to the minutes he plays with Ventspils. Bertans’ main offensive options are his three point shot and driving hard to the rim. He is not afraid to dunk on the big guys and got some severe rejections during the camp that did not de-motivate him to try again. He likes to go for several cross-over moves to create the necessary space for his shot. The Latvian guard is able split defenses with his speed and is high-percentage long distance shooter.

David Jelinek – SG – 1m94 – 1990

One of the younger players that I really liked was David Jelinek. The Czech guard showed excellent athletic abilities and a real will to score the basketball. He has already NBA three point range in catch and shoot situations, which he executes particularly well. Jelinek can speed up the fast-break and finish on highlight-reel like dunks. He has already a nice arsenal of ball and pass fakes when driving that give him the opportunity to score the ball close the basket. He needs to develop his mid-range game a bit and probably get a bit stronger but the minutes he gets on ACB level are certainly helping him in his development.

Nikos Pappas – PG – 1m91 – 1990

The Greek guard looked improved this year compared to what we had in mind of him. Still not a NBA or European top-level athlete, Pappas has the feel for the game and he is far from losing it. His dominance from two years ago on U18 level is not there because he can not outsmart the players on every occasion anymore. But his passing skills are excellent even if he forced too much the highlight play in the camp which gave him a terrible amount of turnovers. As we heard, he did quite well in the Greek League this season on the Senior level so it will be interesting to see what is next for him.

Mindaugas Kuzminskas – SF/PF – 2m03 – Early Entry – 1989

The Lithuanian early entry candidate played a camp where you could barely see him, somehow similar to last year. But he has a very interesting arsenal of offensive moves and showed in Treviso that he has NBA three-point range as well. Kuzminskas can put the ball on the floor and finish with two-handed dunks against the defense when attacking the basket. He is doing also a lot of the dirty job that is not seen in the stats which is a bit different to his role he has with his team in Lithuania. This shows that he is a guy who can easily adapt to any situations.

Dejan Musli – C – 2m11 – 1991

The best Center in the camp was the Serbian Dejan Musli who looks better and better when it comes to his body structure. Still not a very explosive or elegant player, his moves look a bit smoother right now and he feels a lot more confident when putting the ball on the floor. During the camp, there was nearly anybody that could stop him once he has found his position in the low post and received the ball. He can finish here with either hand on the jump hook but most of his moves look a bit soft. His hands are great and he nearly catches all the passes he gets out of the Pick and Roll situations to finish.

Musli has clearly improved in his game when he needs or wants to dribble the ball. He can easily bring his man down to the low block when he receives the ball on the wing by backing him up with a few dribbles and moving closer to the basket. He is also not afraid to start the fast break with several dribbles, even if this is not really his role. As he is not the fastest player, it would also be a better decision making if he shares the ball on these moments and runs the break as a trailer option. He needs to finish stronger though when he is close to the basket to become a really dominant player on this level but being born in 1991, there is still a lot of progress margin left.

Ousmane Camara – C/PF – 2m04 – Early Entry – 1989

One of the more unknown players in the camp was the French Center Ousmane Camara. Even if he has only limited offensive skills because of poor hands, the player from Le Havre showed an extreme will and massive presence on the rebound. He worked very hard throughout the camp in this aspect of the game and nearly score all his baskets on offensive rebounds or after good passes of his team mates. His Free-throw shot looks very bad and underlines his current weaknesses. Camara can score the basketball only when being very close to the basket and the question is how much upside he has when it comes to his shooting touch. Physically, he has all the tools to become a high-level player, but he needs to work on his basketball skills and fundamentals if he wants to have an impact on the next level.

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After having discussed the NBA prospects in Treviso, I take a closer look at the other players present in Treviso that may be NBA candidates in the next years or stay in Europe.

Let’s start this report with Pablo Aguilar, not only because he was one of the best players in the tournament but because he is the first one in the alphabetical order. After having seen him several times in the ACB this season, I was however quite surprised how well he did in this setting, being more of a hard working player. First of all, you recognize a very interesting body structure with a nice wingspan (216cm versus 203cm size) and a large shoulders.

The main offensive weapon of Aguilar is his great jump shot which he can hit from around the key pretty well. His baseline shot looks very easy and he has range up to the NBA three point line. He has also a good presence in the rebound and is not afraid to dribble out and go coast to coast. He recognizes the game very well and knows how to get his team mates open with pass fakes for example. He knows what he does on court and looks like playing always under control. His season in Granada helped him to develop into a very interesting prospect. He should stay one more year with his current team in order to gain even more playing time on the ACB level before he can start to be a contributor in the Euroleague

One of the players that I really wanted to see was the Hungarian G/F Adam Hanga. Hanga showed an interesting combination of speed, athletic abilities and basketball skills. Being pretty aggressive on the court, Hanga can handle the ball pretty well and likes to drive to the basket. During stretches, he took the ball to play PG for his team which he did quite well. His great speed helps him to beat shorter players on the drive where he can go for the dunk over the defense or finish for example with a floater, also over taller players.

The main problem is however his jump shot which needs some development. His relatively slow mechanics and a shooting setup with the ball in front of his face don’t give him the possibility right now to arm his shot against aggressive defenders. It will be interesting to see what is Hanga up to next year, if he stays in Hungary or not. First of all, he will try to give some good impressions during the U20 European Championship B Division in Skopje this summer.

The only Lithuanian player in the camp was Mindaugas Kuzminskas from Siauliai. The athletic wing player showed some interesting aspects, good fakes and a nice range, when he is open. He is working well in the offensive rebound despite not being that big or tall. His jumping abilities help him in that area though and his correct speed and ball handling are reason why his drive is one of his best options at the moment.

Carl Ona Embo showed some nice flashes of his offensive scoring talent. Being not that tall with only 1m83, Ona Embo needs to become a better play maker if he wants to have role going further than the scoring guard. He can hit the three pointer in series, also out of the dribble but he struggles in his passing technique as you could see him several times going for too high or too low dishes out of his drives.

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Nikos Pappas was definitely not in his best days in Treviso. You could not see any improvement in his most to be improved parts of the game, athleticism and ball handling under pressure. However, you still have here a player with a terrific understanding of the game. He can drive pretty well despite looking very slow. Out of these penetrations, he can score on the layup correctly but he is more active in creating spaces for his team mates or drawing fouls to go to the line.

Another player that drew a lot of attention was the Kazakh PF/C Anton Ponomarev. The probably best player ever coming from Astana struggled a bit in the beginning to adjust his game to a level that he has never played against. Ponomarev showed a very good jump shot for a guy of his size (2m09) and also displayed an interesting but still to be developed back to the basket game. His court vision and understanding is overdeveloped and you could see him check around what the current game situation is.

His jump shot is at the moment his strongest asset, nailing with high accuracy around the key but also a potential good three point threat. He is very aggressive on the court, fights a lot and is on every hot situation to dive for the ball or to tip the ball away. With his move to Hyères-Toulon where he signed a four year contract, he should develop pretty well over the next years as the level of competition he faces will be a lot higher than in his current situation.

Tomas Satoransky was clearly one of the most talented players in the whole camp. The Czech forward, that can also play guard and even Point Guard, showed an incredible feel for the game, great athletic abilities and an above average scoring will. Even if his shot is a bit unstable which is probably the result of an underdeveloped body at the moment, Satoransky can hit the ball from all around the court when he is open. When he gets defended harder, his shooting mechanics are not that great anymore and his shot looks more like throwing the ball to the rim.

However, Satoransky was really impressive when driving to the basket as he could finish extremely well when being close to the basket. He showed great jumping abilities and hammered down one of the best dunks of the three days with a huge put back against the whole defense. Satoransky ran the show for the team he played and his big time talent was one of the major discussion points during the camp. It is not a big surprise that Cajasol Sevilla signed him according to several reports and he is supposed to make an immediate impact in the ACB right from next year.

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Alexey Shved is already a regular participant to the Reebok Eurocamp, but he did not show that much of a development since last year. However, his upper body looked a lot stronger. He is a great scorer when his shot is falling and his jump shot looks so easy and nice from any distance. Shved should finally get playing time with CSKA next season and after that, it will be interesting to see what level he can reach. He seems to recognize now better when to stop shooting and switching in his role to be a PG, a problem that was present the previous years. He is still one of the most interesting players in Europe right now.

To finish the report, let’s take a look at the Russian Center Artem Zabelin. He gained more than 10kg this season which was totally lost for him because of a severe injury. In general, Zabelin did not look like he has lost anything in his basketball talent, his jump shots look impressive for a player of his size and in defense, he excels in shot blocking. On the other hand, he is not that explosive as a player and he did not really showed polished move in the low post.

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Here we go for quick recap of the action I was able to catch from the Reebok Eurocamp in Treviso so far. A camp that has representatives from all the 30 NBA teams in attendance in addition to a long list of Agents and representatives from European teams as well.

This report has been written Sunday at noon but is online posted right now due to Internet connection problems. More on the Reebok Eurocamp will follow later this week.

• The first game of the camp has been played on Saturday morning where I only arrived so I could not watch it. However, players that impressed were Stefan Markovic who run the PG job very well. Jaka Klobucar did what I like him for apparently. That means, a good shot from behind the arc and his typical left handed passes out of his wrist. Alexey Shved also showed again all his talent.
• In the 2nd game of the camp, Boban Marjanovic finished with an impressive 26 evaluation. The Serbian giant, one of the only Serbians allowed to play here, showed his incredible large game and scored with his typical post up move, some kind of jump hook. He did a good job from the free-throw line and was a big force in the defensive rebound. On the other side, Rodrigue Beaubois showed his nice combination of athleticism and skills but his shot was not falling and he got a little injury that took him out of the morning game of Day 2. Pablo Aguilar showed a good game, something he confirmed this morning. The 1989 born forward has an all-in-control type of play, going for both SF and PF positions. His range goes out to the NBA three point line, but despite not hitting that many shots you could see that he will improve in that area in the next years. The Czech youngster Tomas Satoransky impressed lots of people in the attendance with his great feel for the game and the possibility to see him run the PG in the next years.
• Nando de Colo showed his great court vision on Day 1 with a multitude of high light passes. Next to all these plays, there was one play that impressed me really while seeing him play. In fact, after a lazy behind the back pass by himself, he came back into the game immediately and stole the ball on midcourt to dish an easy assist for one of his team mates. This day was also a good opportunity to get a first impression of the Kazakh player Anton Ponomarev who definitely lacks of high-quality basketball experience and ball handling skills, but showed great will in the rebound and good scoring touch. The French guard Abdoulaye Mbaye showed his scoring talent on the 2-guard position but having a player like de Colo in his team, he had never to handle the ball on the 1 so that his potential on the PG could not be determined.
• On the downside of Day 1 were the disappointing play of guys like Vladimir Dasic, who still seems to have some concentration problems, Nikos Pappas, who struggles to bring up the ball against aggressive defense despite a great understanding in the half court offense or Roger Aboubakar Zaki who insists on shooting from behind the arc with a mediocre result.

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The Nike Hoop Summit 2009 has seen the first victory of the World Select team since Dirk Nowitzki in 1998. The team of coach Rob Beveridge took over the lead in the final minutes of the game despite being athletically far behind the more spectacular US kids. Being more limited in that are was not a big surprise but the more intelligent and clutch play in the last quarter secured this big win. Beveridge said after the game that it was the most intelligent group of big guys he has coached in his 5 year experience of the Hoop Summit. Let’s talk a look at the players that used the event to boost their stock.

Milan Macvan (Serbia – 2m06 – PF – 1989) 23pts 14rebs 6asts

If there was one player that was supposed to struggle in this type of competition because of his lack of athletic abilities, it was Milan Macvan. But what a show he put on the floor in Portland, displaying that basketball is all about fundamentals, shooting and knowledge of the game. He outsmarted the whole US frontcourt with fakes and a massive presence on the offensive glass and you could easily see that he is the player that is currently active on the highest competition level  (EuroCup) of all the present guys.

Macvan, despite being undersized and slower than his opponents, showed a nice arsenal of offensive weapons that nobody could really respond. He excels in pick-and-roll or pop situations where his massive screens put the US team several times in trouble because they could not read his offensive positioning. As Macvan has deep range, he hit one shot in the money time to seal the game a good meter behind the NBA three point line, it is very difficult to defend him because he is not afraid of driving where he can protect the ball very well.

Out of these drive situations, he has a great court-vision to dish the ball to his open team mates. Defensively, Macvan tries to play more with his basketball understanding than with athletic abilities and speed. Laterally, you see him struggle when being attacked of the dribble but a faster opponent. This lack of athleticism may prevent him from being a real NBA prospect, but for the European level, he has every tool to become a dominant PF in a near future.

Donatas Motiejunas (Lithuania – 2m15 – PF – 1990) 21pts 8rebs

Donatas is one of these incredibly talented 1990 born Bigs with the combination of size and pure basketball talent. Together with Jan Vesely and Tomislav Zubcic, they represent the future of European basketball of this age category, not to speak of Ricky Rubio. Motiejunas came to Portland fully motivated despite missing the Final Four of the Baltic Challenge Cup with his home team. And right from the start of the game, you could see the talent level of Motiejunas is tough to be matched.

He started the game with two nice drives of his left hand where no defender had a chance to stop him. Out of these drives, he can go for a perfect kick out pass for the open shooter or finish of some kind of running hook shot, a shot that he handles also with his right hand. When posting up, he often goes for some kind of turn around jump shot, which he executes on both sides and that he knocks down even when being fouled.

In this game, Motiejunas was not highly present on rebounding, but his size and mobility give him the possibility to grab a nice amount of missed shots. His current position is being the PF but depending on the matchups, he can play either the SF or the C position during stretches. He is now back to Lithuania and will discuss the possibility to enter the NBA Draft with his parents and agent. He is certainly not ready yet to play on that level right now as he is physically only average at the moment. And the question how he develops when gaining weight has still to be answered.

Tomislav Zubcic (Croatia – 2m11 – PF – 1990) 17pts 5rebs 2blks

The Croatian forward has a really nice showing in this game despite playing a lot on the SF position because of the somehow strange selection of the World Squad that had no real SF on his roster. But Zubcic showed his nice versatility and ability to handle the ball. In certain press situations, he even took over the PG job to bring the ball up and use his size to pass the ball above the shorter US guards that were setting up the defense.

Zubcic used his size and timing to be very present on the offensive glass where he managed to capture several offensive rebounds and either finishing them with a layup or giving a nice pass to his team mate bigs. He had several strong drives of the baseline where he finished despite being fouled pretty hard at times. His nice execution speed helps him to gain advantage when he is guarded by a bigger player.

Nikos Pappas (Greece – 1m93 – PG – 1990) 10pts 3asts 3stls

After having put on a big show at the Albert Schweitzer Tournament in Mannheim one year ago, it was time again for Pappas to shine a little bit on the international scene. The Greek guard that plays currently in Spain showed that he is a nice scoring talent and can hit the three ball without any problem in catch and shoot fashion. To create a clean shot against the more athletic US guards is however not his strength and you could see Pappas sometimes go for some difficult running floaters, which he can hit even when jumping of the wrong foot.

I don’t know if it is because it is on TV, but to me, Pappas looked a bit faster on his drives where he beat the defense several times to finish of a layup. He can create for his team mates when driving to the hoop but he struggled sometimes to bring up the ball against the highly aggressive defense and needed the help of Zubcic to come over mid-court. Far away from being a NBA prospect right now, Pappas will probably move into the direction of becoming a solid Euroleague player in the next years and a constant member of the Greek national team once the current generation has retired.

Kevin Seraphin (France – 2m06 – C – 1989) 8pts 9rebs 4blks

Being only used during limited minutes in Cholet, the event in Portland was a bit of a coming out party on the highest level for the French Center. Displaying great athleticism and very big hands, Kevin Seraphin showed a big presence on the rebound on both ends of the court. You could see his arm raise several times out of the paint to get the ball far above the rim. He also had several blocked shots coming on help situations or as a second row goalkeeper.

Offensively though, Seraphin has still a lot of progress before as he is not very accurate when it comes to jump shots. Close to the rim, he finishes with dunks or layups but missed a couple of close shots around the basket. He has already a big body and knows how to use in order to gain a favorable position over the defenders. He should see a lot more minutes from next season on in the French championship and it will be interesting to see at what level he will be after a full season of professional basketball.

Watch here below the highlights of the game. (Courtesy of OregonLive)

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This Easter weekend is once again packed with interesting tournaments and events around European Youth basketball. I try to give a short preview about all the stuff that you can follow throughout the net over the upcoming days.

• The main event may be the Nike Hoop Summit in Portland. The World team is this team made of mainly European players and it features some of the most prolific prospects around. While the US eyes will probably be mostly on Donatas Motiejunas, the roster features some future Euroleague players like Milan Macvan or Nikos Pappas. Draftexpress is covering the event live from Portland and has a first look at some of the major Europeans (Motiejunas, Macvan, Jackson) in the event. The excellent Blazer’s Edge is also covering the days as the event is happening at their home base in Oregon. They cover Motiejunas too in their first article about the world team but give also a first look at Mamadou Samb. The main sponsor of the event has of course also big coverage from Portland and gives the writing pen to some of the players of the event. Read here what Donatas Motiejunas (again him) tells us about his first time in United States and also what the French Edwin Jackson has to report
• The second place to be these days is Vilagarcia in Spain where one of the biggest U18 tournaments is played these days. Spain, Angola, Russia, Germany, Italy, France, New Zealand and the Czech Republic are playing here to see who has the best cards for the upcoming Summer Championships. Next to the official website, our Spanish friend Jaime Martinez Lafargue at Solobasket gives a great coverage of the Tournament, unfortunately only in Spanish. Read his scouting report of the first day right here.
• Eurobasket.com reports briefly about the Final tournament of Serbian U17 teams in Belgrade
• It has been last weekend already, but Serbia has won the prestigious Bellegarde tournament for U16 teams in France. Second place was for Greece while Turkey finished third and France on the last place. This weekend, Serbia plays in Ragusa (Italy) another U16 tournament against Spain, Russia and the home team of Italy. The opening game of the tournament saw Spain beat Italy 77-63.
• To stay in Italy, the 5th edition of the Memorial Graziano Barila is taking place these days and feature a couple of interesting teams. Team Ohio, the Sabonis Basketball School or Olimpija Ljubljana are the most notable names coming to the tournament to fight against the local youth teams from Italy. You can follow the results and check the rosters right here.
• The Cholet Mondial Basket Tournament will start today in Western France and will feature some very interesting teams too. Despite the withdrawals of some teams before the tournament for different reasons, the organization has managed to bring in such talented squads like Real Madrid (without Nikola Mirotic though), BCM Ostrava or Stella Azzurra Roma next to the traditional French professional Farm teams. Follow the tournament on the official website
• Finally, the German U19 league is looking for its last Final Four participants this weekend after the qualification of ALBA Berlin and Paderborn Baskets. In a highly anticipated (some considered it as a potential Final) game between Trier and Urspring, the team around Maik Zirbes tries to go for a decisive game after having lost the opener of the series one week ago and Maurice Stuckey’s team. The other quarter-final should see TSV Tröster Breitengüssbach qualify against Bayern Munich.

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The International team of the 2009 edition of the Nike Hoops Summit has been published.

Mamadou Samb (FC Barcelona)
Matias Nocedal (TAU Vitoria)
Nikos Pappas (Real Madrid)
Edwin Jackson (Nanterre)
Mateo Gaynor (Benetton Treviso)
Tomislav Zubcic (Cibona Zagreb)
Milan Macvan (Hemofarm Vrsac)
Kevin Seraphin (Cholet Basket)
Donatas Motiejunas (Aisciai Kaunas)
Zhang Dayu (Zhejiang Wanma)

The squad looks very promising with a massive inside game around Motiejunas, Macvan, Seraphin, Samb and Zubcic.

The Nike Hoop Summit will be played in Portland on the 11th April 2009.

Source: El Mundo Deportivo

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On of the most surprising stories is the move of Enes Kanter to the United States. The 16 year old Center that played both U18 and U16 Championships will play on the high school level next season (Winchendon HS). The goal of the Turkish Basketball federation is to “transform” Kanter into a SF and have him operational on the Senior level for the World Championship 2010. I have some serious doubts about this move as Kanter did not show anything that would make him a possible wing in the future. Additionally, brining him to a High School in the United States is probably not the right decision to go into this direction. He would most likely dominate physically and use his force inside. The Turkish federation looks like not knowing exactly what they do as they give away one of their most talented players to the United States instead of forming him themselves in Istanbul.

Nikos Pappas, the guard that led the Greek U18 team to Gold in the European Championship signed a five-year deal with Bilbao in Spain. He will not play there however the first season and will be loaned to Real Madrid Reserve team in LEB Bronze. For me, this is another strange move as apparently no Greek team signed him. Bilbao on the other hand may have put one hand on one of the future top guards in Europe.

Another surprising move is the decision of Donatas Motiejunas to leave Zalgiris and sign most likely with Aisciai, one of the weakest teams in the LKL. Being linked to BC Kaunas, the second team of Zalgiris, at first, the latest rumors send him to the Atletas-Aisciai. The look for minutes is understandable but why he leaves the Zalgiris building instead and playing in BC Kaunas is quite a strange decision to me.

Fortitudo Bologna is trying out some youngsters these days by bringing over to Italy Filip Sepa from Serbia and Hristo Zahariev from Bulgaria. Nothing has been signed so far however. Another team that was active by bringing in new talent was Real Madrid who signed Dusan Bogdanovic, a 2m06 tall Forward born in 1993. Talking about 1993 born kids (UPDATE: Bogdanovic’s home team Vukovar denied the transfer of the player). Union Olimpija added Djordje Micic to their Senior team roster. The 2m00 tall forward played with the Bosnia-Herzegovina National team during the U16 European Championship. In France, the most interesting transfer may be the signings of Christophe Leonard by Cholet and Alexis Tanghe in Dijon. Finally, Robin Benzing will go back to his former team TV Langen after the NCAA did not accept him to play for Michigan.

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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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The favorites

If you consider the different tournaments that have been played so far this season, the main teams to win this year’s edition of the competition are Greece and Serbia. After the astonishing dominance in Mannheim, the Greek team around Nikos Pappas showed a great talent level despite missing some inside forces.

On the other hand, the Serbian team, that is build around the FMP Junior Team core of Andrija Milutinovic, Bojan Subotic and Dejan Musli. The non-consideration of Branislav Djekic or Lazar Radosavljevic may be a surprise for some people but still Serbia looks like a clear cut favorite to reach the Gold medal game.

The outsiders

Some other teams can be considered as potential Medal candidates, and those are the traditional teams like Spain, France or Lithuania. The Spanish guys, that will of course play without Ricky Rubio may lack of some size because they don’t have any player taller than 2m06 in their roster. So the paint has to be kept clean by guys like Toni Vicens or Alberto Jodar who either miss the necessary size or are no inside players. The least that one could say is that the Spanish backcourt of David Garcia, Alejandro Hernandez and Dani Perez is ready to face some tough opposition.

I also spoke with Luis from Draftexpress.com and here is his opinion on the Spanish U18 team.

I think Spain has a chance to reach the medals, although I think Serbia is just on an entire different level and no other team should be able to challenge them (perhaps not even Greece, although they are the other top candidate for the final).

Regarding Spain, I like the fact we have a heady PG in Dani Pérez, a skilled guard in Alex Hernández, aggressive and skilled wings in Jorge Santana or Marcos León, both capable of slash and shoot, an all-around physical freak in Alberto Jodar, and finally, we’ve added some size. You probably remember Toni Vicens, the undersized and over weighted hustler quite effective under the rim.

For France, their performance in Mannheim was really bad, but the uncommon practice methods of their coach seem to have some results. Les Bleus won their tournament in Douai behind a great team effort and playing without their supposed best player in person of Christophe Leonard who signed a pro-contract with Cholet recently. Ludovic Puigcerbier, who is following French youth basketball for basketsession.com gave us his thoughts on the chances for the French in Greece:

After a difficult preparation, the French U18 team could hurt more than one team during this year’s U18 competition. Despite some bad results in Mannheim, Euro-Essone and Manzanares, the French team has however beaten teams like Spain, Croatia or Lithuania during their preparation and has also won the tournament in Douai. The team has the necessary talent with players like Christophe Léonard, Andrew Albicy or Alexis Tanghe but we have to see how the team will play and behave during the tournament. But they have the possibilities to beat every team on any given night. On the other hand, the inside sector looks pretty weak though to be a contender for a medal. I think, they will finish between 5th and 7th place.

Lithuania is always present when it comes to Youth Championships. And this year, with super talent Donatas Motiejunas in the middle, Lithuania could eventually be considered as one of the main teams for a medal. But one player does not make them a Gold Medal team as they significantly miss some offensive quality in the back court. For the Lithuanian federation, the official goal is between 3 and 8 but the current results made some people think that this goal will be hard to reach especially if you take into consideration that Motiejunas was injured during two weeks and he is badly wanted by the U20 team to play with them. So eventually, he may leave after a few games if the U18 team can not reach a medal. Because of the lack of potential in the 1990 generation except Motiejunas and Tautvydas Slezas, the coaching staff added some interesting 1991 born guys where especially Gilvydas Biruta showed good talent so far.

Who else do we have?

Another team that has to be mentioned is of course Croatia and their impressive front court composed of Tomislav Zubcic, Mario Delas and Leon Radosevic. With the addition of Toni Prostran in the backcourt since the Albert-Schweitzer Tournament, the team is improving on the talent side but now remains the question if they can translate this into decisive games. The Croats, who should win their group will have their real opponents in the 2nd phase where they will play against France, Russia, Germany or Ukraine.All in all, this side of the table looks a lot easier to reach the semis than the other side where Serbia, Lithuania, Greece, Spain and Italy fight for the two spots most likely.

The Turkish team played also a interesting tournament in Mannheim and showed some stints of talent in Douai too. However, I have some doubts if they can go for it all in Greece as they seem to depend too much on their PF beat Deniz Kiligli who is not the most regular player in the world. They have some good scoring in the backcourt and feature 16yr old Enes Kanter who can dominate in the paint but it really looks like the left-handed hook machine from Fenerbahce is the guy that decides about the performance of the Turkish team. And one bad game may be enough to fall from 1-4th to 5-8th place.

Germany played an interesting tournament in Douai where they won the games they have to win. In their home event in Mannheim, they lost the game they had to win to qualify for the Top8. So Kay Blümel and his team know how good or how bad they can play, especially after the poor performances in Spain a few days ago. But the absence of some of the main players may be a reason for this as explains the German head coach:

After the very bad performance during the tournament in Spain, where we played without six of our first 10 players (Maurice Stuckey, Simon Schmitz, Robert Hülsewede, Femi Oladipo, Niels Giffey and Alexander Schrempf) and lost heavily against Spain, France and Croatia, the motivation of the team was really down low. We tried to improve this during our training camp these days. Unfortunately, we have to play without Oladipo (torn ankle) and Hülsewede (broken foot) during the Championships which lets a big hole on our SF position. Our goal is to reach the third place in our group first of all and avoid the relegation round.

The game against France in the beginning will be extremely important for us, because they have a team that we can beat.  Russia has improved and showed good games in the Moscow tournament and seems hard to beat. Ukraine is the unknown team in our group and it’s hard for me to predict how good they are right now. But as it will be our third game in the tournament, we have enough time to scout them during the Championship. If we reach our goal and qualify for the next phase, we will see how we continue. But we don’t want to become to high on ourselves and remain with both feet on earth. A place somewhere around 9th like last year would be very satisfying for us.

The Russian U18 team was very disappointing in Mannheim but has found a way back to be a serious outsider in Greece after their performances at the Petrenko Cup in Khimki. The squad has beaten Italy, and the Czech Republic while only failing shortly against the top favorites from Greece. Currently, no world class talent has emerged of the 1990 generation in Russia but the mixture of aggressive guards and long tall forwards that characterizes the Russian game is still present. So they are definitely a team to watch in Amaliada and Pyrgos.

Italy that played a correct tournament in Mannheim will see their top talent of the 1991 generation Nicolo Melli joining them. And with this addition on the wing, everything is possible for the Squadra. The young forward may be one of the best talents in Europe and if he can elevate his game to what he showed during the LegaDue semi-finals, he may be the leader that could help the Italians reach an unpredictable success in the tournament.

Fighting for relegation

Belgium went up to Division A in 2007 behind a great team effort and the nice games of Jorn Steinbach and Jean-Marc Mwema. But these two guys are born in 1989 and will not be available anymore. But some talent of the last year’s win is still on the roster and the addition of Yannick Moray should give the team of Fred Wilmot the necessary power in the back court. On the other hand, no real inside presence on this level will be tough to handle.

Israel, who plays Belgium in the group stage may be the team that can avoid relegation the easiest way in beating the before mentioned in their opener. The departure of Daniel Rom back to Russia lets a big whole in the middle of course but the typical fighting spirit and the athleticism of Carmel Bouchman may help them to stay in the league. This opener will be extremely important for both teams.

Estonia will feature one of the most interesting players to follow of the tournament with Siim-Sander Vene who played already a good tournament last season. Next to him, not too much talent is to be seen but maybe it is worth to take a closer look at the 1991 born Kristjan Rinaldo (yes, that’s his name) who put up some correct stats with the U16 last summer and plays for the Honka Academy in Finland.

Not much to say about the Ukrainian team as I barely know any player there and could not find any results or comments on them on the net. The main goal for the team is to stay in the Division as they have a pretty interesting 1991 generation that could compete next season on the highest level.

Lauris Blaus tries to lead his Latvian team to the necessary wins in their group to stay away from the Relegation round. He will hopefully get some support from the talented 1991 generation around Janis Antrops and Harijs Rubenis.

Bulgaria will be built around their back-court combo of Hristo Zahariev and Bozhidar Avramov. I have put them in this part of the preview one loss against Latvia could mean that the team has to play on relegation round. On the other hand, the team has the talent to pass against Croatia or Turkey but I don’t know how they could handle the inside presence of these two nations.

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