Basketball: Monaco will face Fenerbahçe in the Euroleague quarter-final

Monaco will face Fenerbahçe in the quarter-finals of the Basketball Euroleague, which finished sixth in the regular season on Friday at the end of the 34th and final day, during which Efes Istanbul completed its rise in the standings with a qualification. .

Present at the Final Four last spring for the first time in its history, ASM will have to pass through the doors of “Fener” (6th) to repeat its performance. However, she almost found an old acquaintance, Olympiacos (5th), her tormentor in the quarter-finals in 2022 then in the semi-finals last year: the Greek team needed overtime to defeat at home (84-81) of the Turkish club in a match which determined the opponent of Monaco (the loser) and that of FC Barcelona (4th).

Like last season against Maccabi Tel Aviv (3-2), the “Roca Team” will have home field advantage (with a possible fifth decisive match at home), valuable against the winner of the Euroleague in 2017, and its passionate supporters.

The Turkish club changed coaches in mid-December, the Lithuanian Sarunas Jasikevicius replacing, six months after his departure from FC Barcelona, ​​the Greek Dimitris Itoudis, and relies on the experience of the Greek Nick Calathes at the head as well as on winger Nigel Hayes-Davis (14.5 pts average). The American broke the record for points scored in a Euroleague match at the end of March (50, including 9/16 3-pointers).

The Monegasques must, by the time the series begins on April 23 or 24, have regained some of the physical freshness that they have been lacking in recent weeks. They will also hope to count on the talent of Mike James, who on March 7 became the top scorer in the history of the Euroleague (4,558 points now, 18.7 average this season).

The Rock club finished behind Panathinaikos, back in the forefront after a catastrophic last season (17th and penultimate with 23 defeats in 34 days). The owner of the six-time winner of the Euroleague (the last time in 2011), Dimitrios Giannakopoulos, entrusted the recovery mission to the Turk Ergin Ataman, European champion 2021 and 2022 with Efes Istanbul, and considerably strengthened the squad with the arrivals of French interior Mathias Lessort and point guards Kendrick Nunn (ex-Washington Wizards) and Kostas Sloukas, stolen from the big rival, Olympiacos.

With four more victories than the Athenians in the regular season, Real Madrid looks down on the rest of the squad with its 27 successes. The reigning champions and holders of the record for coronations (11) took a long lead alone, with a stable squad reinforced by Argentine leader Facundo Campazzo.

They have all the weapons to break the curse according to which the team having finished first in the regular season, since the introduction of the single pool in 2016, has never been crowned European champion.

Only 16th ten days ago, Efes Istanbul finished with a bang (8 wins for 2 losses), awakened by the promotion to the bench of the Croatian Tomislav Mijatovic (in place of Erdem Can), to snatch the last jump seat for the “play-in” by dynamiting Red Star Belgrade (100-55) Thursday at home.

The team of leader Shane Larkin (best Euroleague player this season in the evaluation) is ahead of Partizan Belgrade, quarter-finalist last season who needed a success on Friday against Valencia (79-66) combined with a defeat of his great enemy to qualify. Efes (9th) will face in the first round of the “play-in”, established this season on the model of the NBA, Virtus Bologna, which finished in the last qualifying place (10th) by losing on Friday at home against Victoria (95-91).

The Basque club (8th) will face Maccabi Tel Aviv (7th), a match whose winner will go to the quarter-finals (against Panathinaikos). The loser will have a new chance to rally them (to challenge Real), against the winner of Efes-Bologna.