European Prospects

The final day of the 2009 U16 European Championship has arrived and the decisions will arrive about Gold, Silver and Bronze. But the day started of course with the games for the places 5 to 8.

• And there it was France that made the biggest impression in the opener with a nice first half based on aggressive defense in the passing lanes that gave them several fast breaks. Livio Jean-Charles was the main in the middle that did good work on both sides on the court and displayed his potential through a nice three pointer. Turkey was more or less lost as they only had some scoring coming from Özgür Sahin from three point area. In the second half, France could not hold their intensity alive but managed to bring the game home in the end. William Howard scored on the wing and Benjamin John launched the fast breaks. Sahin continued to be the lonely threat of the Turks despite some moves in the paint of Berkay Candan. France wins it and take the 7th spot.
• The game for the fifth place featured Croatia and Russia and it were the Russians that started without Gleb Goldyrev that took the lead in the first twenty minutes. Ivan Vadeev was the main scorer with his perfect 3/3 threes while Andrey Loginov despite giving away some layups was doing the job in the paint with 9. For Croatia, it was again Matej Buovac that displayed the most danger as connected for 15 points in 20 minutes of play. Russia increased their lead up to 22 points in the third quarter but Croatia did not gave up. Buovac and the never tired Marko Ramljak brought them back in the game and Henrik Sirko knocked down 3 threes for an impressive 12-0 scoring run to be even at 66. But Valery Truchkin took the game in his hand and made the decisive plays to give the Russians a 4 point win and a final 5th place.
• The Bronze Medal game opposed Serbia and the surprising Polish team. Serbia started strong in the game behind the shooting of Aleksandar Cvetkovic scored several nice jumpers from mid-range. Nenad Miljenovic showed his versatility by hitting jumpers and creating for his team mates. Poland looked like running out of gas at the end of the tournament and none of their leaders was able to keep the team awake in the first half. Przemyslaw Karnowski tried to enforce the Serbian defense in the paint but his team mates had some trouble to give him the ball down low. Poland immediately started the second half with a 10-0 run that held them in the reach of the Serbians. Miljenovic and Cvetkovic continued to score but the Serbian inside players had more and more trouble to keep Karnowski out of the paint. And an immediate run to start the 4th quarter came from the Polish side and the game was totally open. Piotr Niedzwiedzki stole another ball in the passing lane and finished the break with a big dunk. Yet another dunk by the forward gave them the lead back for the first time. Now Miljenovic took over the game and Poland started to panic, not knowing anymore how to give the ball inside. A last three pointer by Michal Michalak kept the hope alive but an error on the inbound pass destroyed the last Polish chances.  Serbia wins it by 6 and gets the Bronze Medal.
• The Final of the 2009 edition of the U16 European Championship of Basketball has been played between Lithuania and Spain. The game started very slowly as both teams seemed extremely nervous in front of a packed Sporto Hale with more than 5000 spectators. Spain created then a slight advantage behind the scoring of Jorge Sanz and Jaime Fernandez. They went up to 15-5 on a 8-0 run in the first quarter. Lithuania was still searching their game and it was only the entrance of the versatile Tomas Lekunas that helped them to improve. On the Spanish side, Alejandro Suarez continued to net the jump shots so that the Iberians stayed ahead. Tauras Jogela still did not find the way back to the great games he had before the semis but at only 6 down at half, Lithuania is still there. In the second half, Lithuania came back in the first minutes with the drives of Mantas Mockevicius and a nice 12-0 run. But Jaime Fernandez was still the main scorer on the Spanish side so that they took the lead back behind his big drives. The Lithuanian coaching team had then a very strange choice with letting Jogela on the floor for the last defense of the third quarter and he got his fourth foul on a rebound situation. Paulius Semaska started to lose of his control of the game and slowly Spain was taking over the situation. In the final minutes, Lithuania could not get open baskets anymore and Spain stayed ahead with their excellent team play. In the end, Spain won it 70-64 and takes home the Gold Medal.
• The official All-Tournament team of the tournament: Nenad Miljenovic (Serbia), Jaime Fernandez (Spain), Gleb Goldyrev (Russia), Tauras Jogela (Lithuania) and Przemyslaw Karnowski (Poland). I had the same choice except that I voted for Sergey Karasev instead of Gleb Goldyrev. The MVP trophy went to Tauras Jogela from Lithuania. The Fair-Play trophy of the tournament was also taken by the Polish center who played himself into the hearts of the local fans with his playing style but also in his role as injured people transporter during the Bronze Medal game.