FIBA Tournament Play

[MikkeMan]

Serbia blows out Finland in the 4th quarter, and Bjelica finishes with 19 on only 11 shots. He was shooting 62% from the field for the tournament, and that is going higher with this game. More significantly, he had 14 rebounds...really nice game. Now they have a couple days off before playing the Czech Republic (with no NBA players) in the quarter-finals Tuesday.

One player we haven't talked about in this tournament is the much-heralded Mario Hezonja. The 5th pick in the draft has been terrible, averaging only 6.7 PPG on 41% shooting (27% on threes).

Even though Bjelica was getting well rebounds in this game, I think it was actually less impressive than his game against Germany. Finns team lacks badly size (Bjelica was taller and stronger than any of Finns players) but Finns still won rebounding battle in this game. (grabbed 30% of offensive boards and 77% of defensive boards compared to Serbia's 23% and 70%) Just Finns big men alone grabbed 8 offensive boards and they were not all when Bjelica was in bench. Germany had much bigger team and they got just 19% of offensive boards and 68% of defensive boards compared to Serbia's 32% and 81%. Only Dirk was able to get one offensive board when Bjelica was defending him.

I agree that Hezonga didn't look too good but very seldom any 19 year old player look good in FIBA Euro games. Whole Croatia team under performed badly in last two games and for example Saric who should be already much more NBA ready, was pretty awful in those losses. 5pts, 3 rbs and 3 TOs with 2/9 FG against Georgia and 4pts, 8rbs, 3TOs with 1/7 FG against Czechs.

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

Serbia by 5 at the half. Finland looks like they could hang in there until the end, so Bjelica should get a lot of minutes in the second half too. He had a very nice 10 and 5 in the first half, on only 6 shots.

A couple observations:

1) FIBA Europe basketball is not very physical...not even close to the NBA, and not even as physical as FIBA Americas. Case in point: Ruduljica, who was awful for the Wolves last year, is a dominant force in this tournament. He is just too strong for this level of play...looks like he is going to go off for 20 points
+ again.

Finland's national team is not very good example of typical FIBA Europe basketball in terms of physicality. Our team just doesn't have any real big men. There are couple of reasons for that. First when nation population is just 5 million, there doesn't exist many athletically gifted big men. Second our team uses a lot of hard hedging in pick and roll defense and that type of defense is pretty hard for less mobile big men. Raduljica weights at least 25 pounds more than any of Finn's big men, so he really looked as unstopable force when he rolled to basket. Kudos to Teodosic for beating our defense badly with his passing.

I watched Spain - Serbia game and Pau Gasol made Raduljica to look every bit as bad as he looked in Wolves jersey.

I like the way Finland played though. They really use a spread, drive and kick offense and try to get tons of 3's up. It worked up through the first half or so, but then Serbia's size and power just took over.

Finland was very, very skilled and well coached. You should be proud Mikkeman!

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

Serbia by 5 at the half. Finland looks like they could hang in there until the end, so Bjelica should get a lot of minutes in the second half too. He had a very nice 10 and 5 in the first half, on only 6 shots.

A couple observations:

1) FIBA Europe basketball is not very physical...not even close to the NBA, and not even as physical as FIBA Americas. Case in point: Ruduljica, who was awful for the Wolves last year, is a dominant force in this tournament. He is just too strong for this level of play...looks like he is going to go off for 20 points
+ again.

2) With Teodosic running the show, Bjelica just doesn't touch the ball enough. He should have more than 6 shots in a half, and he shouldn't have to create all of his own shots. He's very good at putting the ball on the floor and getting to the basket.

3) I know I'm harping on Nemanja's rebounding and I also know that 5 in the first half sounds just fine. But four of the rebounds were long rebounds where the ball bounced beyond the Finns (and Serbs) who had battled for position. He did have one "traditional" box-out rebound with a minute left in the half, so it's not that he can't do it...he just doesn't seem very interested in rebounding.

4) Bjelica plays more like a wing than a PF. His standard position on offense is beyond the 3-point line, and he handles the ball very well...both passing and dribbling. He's a good basketball player. I'll also add that despite his shortcomings in rebounding, he is a passionate player who really seems focused on winning.

I'm looking forward to seeing what he can do in the second half.

On point #4, I can see he and 'Bazz pairing up quite nicely at the two forward spots off the bench. Bjelica will give him space to operate inside and when Nemanja puts the ball on the floor, he can make basket cuts.

[MikkeMan]

I like the way Finland played though. They really use a spread, drive and kick offense and try to get tons of 3's up. It worked up through the first half or so, but then Serbia's size and power just took over.

Finland was very, very skilled and well coached. You should be proud Mikkeman!

Thanks Q! Yes, I agree that our national team really maximizes the potential of our players and I'm indeed proud of them. In good night they are currently able to at least challenge almost any other country except USA and Spain (in full strength). Unlike Flip our coaching stuff has really got the math 3 > 2 and they have build even their defense so that it would feed their offense. Basically they try to get lot of steals to get fast break three-pointer opportunities.

In half court sets they rely a lot of pick and roll between our best player Petteri Koponen and whoever big is playing. Unfortunately they are not using Erik Murphy as a roll man even though he would be probably most skilled option for it. I guess main reason is that other bigs won't be much outside shooters and thus paint would get too crowded. Now Murphy is often in other corner giving more room to operate for the big that is rolling to basket.

I think that one Tyson Chandler like player for our team would immediately improve both offense and defense a lot. Unfortunately there is no that kind of player coming any time soon. I have high hopes for Lauri Markkanen tough. He is 18 years old great stretch PF prospect. He actually was scoring most points per game in FIBA Europe U18 games. Since he is already 6'11, I hope that he could play also some center. Since he is quite athletic for his size, he'll be at better option for rolling basket and he could be utilized also as pick and pop option, which would make offense little less predictable. I think he would have been in our team already this year if he would not have had injury in one of the preparation games.

If you are interested, you can find some information about him already from Draftexpress:

http://www.draftexpress.com/profile/Lauri-Markkanen-73519/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zA-xk_Bo-J4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUC-o6IFgto

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

Good stuff Mikkeman, I'll have to check Lauri out.

The Serbia-Finland game was fun to watch. The ball movement was incredible, by both teams.

[longstrangetrip [enjin:6600564]]

Serbia by 5 at the half. Finland looks like they could hang in there until the end, so Bjelica should get a lot of minutes in the second half too. He had a very nice 10 and 5 in the first half, on only 6 shots.

A couple observations:

1) FIBA Europe basketball is not very physical...not even close to the NBA, and not even as physical as FIBA Americas. Case in point: Ruduljica, who was awful for the Wolves last year, is a dominant force in this tournament. He is just too strong for this level of play...looks like he is going to go off for 20 points
+ again.

2) With Teodosic running the show, Bjelica just doesn't touch the ball enough. He should have more than 6 shots in a half, and he shouldn't have to create all of his own shots. He's very good at putting the ball on the floor and getting to the basket.

3) I know I'm harping on Nemanja's rebounding and I also know that 5 in the first half sounds just fine. But four of the rebounds were long rebounds where the ball bounced beyond the Finns (and Serbs) who had battled for position. He did have one "traditional" box-out rebound with a minute left in the half, so it's not that he can't do it...he just doesn't seem very interested in rebounding.

4) Bjelica plays more like a wing than a PF. His standard position on offense is beyond the 3-point line, and he handles the ball very well...both passing and dribbling. He's a good basketball player. I'll also add that despite his shortcomings in rebounding, he is a passionate player who really seems focused on winning.

I'm looking forward to seeing what he can do in the second half.

On point #4, I can see he and 'Bazz pairing up quite nicely at the two forward spots off the bench. Bjelica will give him space to operate inside and when Nemanja puts the ball on the floor, he can make basket cuts.

Yeah, me too Q...and it's easy to see a rotation strategy that puts them on the floor together frequently. Nemanja also needs a good spot-up 3-point shooter at SG when he's in there, because he's excellent at putting the ball on the floor and kicking out to the open shooter...Martin, LaVine and even Wiggins will all benefit here.

Nemanja plays more like a wing, but he's big enough to play PF and should get most of his minutes there backing up KG. But another nail in the coffin for Rudez is Bjelica's ability to play SF too...gives Flip 4 good options there now without Rudez.

[MikkeMan]

Serbia team has really had the best ball movement of any European team since former Yugoslavia team with Petrovic, Kukoc, Radja and Divac in it.

BTW. Based on Lauri's interview, he is going to play NCAA in either Arizona, Utah or North Carolina university. So you could probably see more games from him in near future than I will see.

[longstrangetrip [enjin:6600564]]

Serbia team has really had the best ball movement of any European team since former Yugoslavia team with Petrovic, Kukoc, Radja and Divac in it.

BTW. Based on Lauri's interview, he is going to play NCAA in either Arizona, Utah or North Carolina university. So you could probably see more games from him in near future than I will see.

Yeah, Serbia is really fun to watch. Teodosic drives me crazy sometimes with his JJ-like hero ball, but he is a terrific shooter and does get his assists too. They are going to be tough to beat.

If you happen to run into Lauri (since I assume all Finns know each other :) ), remind him that there is a very good university on the banks of the mighty Mississippi in Minneapolis that would be happy to welcome him!

[MikkeMan]

I have seen just Spain and Finland game from Bjelica but he has really impressed me in those games. It seems that he does just every time correct decision with the ball. He has very good handle and has regularly beat his man off the dribble. I have also been impressed about his ability to finish over defense in those rare occasions when his defender has been able to hang with him. I have also liked his defense so far. When he has switched to defend smaller players, he has been able to stay pretty well also in front of those. Of course very few of guards in Eurobasket are NBA level in terms of athletic ability (maybe only Parker and Schroder). I also like that Bjelica has been willing to take important shots in the end of game. In previous years, he has given way too often ball to Teodosic in those situations.

BTW. Whole Serbia team has played pretty good defense so far. In previous years, I have hated Teodosic mainly because of his lack of defense. He has often looked just over confident about his ability to win games even without giving much effort on defensive end and the results have been pretty mixed. (2nd in 2014 World cup but only 7th in 2013 Eurobasket, 8th in 2011 Eurobasket) This year I have seen even Teodosic to give quite good effort also in defense and Serbia has looked like the best team in tournament.

Then still some interesting tidbits about other players in this years Eurobasket tournament.

- Pau Gasol shot 6/7 three pointers against Poland. In this years tournament he has shot them 9/12. Maybe he will be stretch PF for Chicago next season.;) Pau Gasol seems to be the real king of FIBA basketball. I don't remember single bad tournament from him. This time he is averaging 23.6 pts, 8 rbs, 3 asts, 2.1 blks and just 1.3 TOs with .69 TS% in 28.9 minutes. He has been clear MVP of the tournament.

- Dennis Schroder seems to be ready to take next step also in NBA. He was pretty good already last year but I predict that he may be so good in next season that Hawks will start considering trading Teague. Schroder was clearly the best player in Germany team that played all teams close but got only one win. He averaged 21 pts, 4.6 rbs, 6 asts with .58 TS% in 30.4 minutes. Only his turnover numbers were not that nice (4.2 per game).

- Tomas Satoransky (he is 6'7 PG that was 2nd round pick of Washington in 2012 draft) seems to be ready for NBA. He played very good Euroleague season in strong Barcelona team. He is currently leader in assists in the tournament with 8.8 per game and Czechs had been able to upset already Croatia. His other numbers have been 13.2 pts, 6.0 rbs, 1.0 stls and 2.7 TOs with .50 TS% in 33.5 minutes. Check him when you will watch Bjelica's next game against Czechs.

- Greek Freak had pretty freakish game in close loss against Spain. He had 17 rebounds with 8 of them in offensive end. Otherwise he has had quite quiet tournament. Greek team has divided court time quite evenly for the whole team and they have played with slow pace which doesn't suite that well for Giannis. Giannis played 34 minutes in semifinal game against Spain. So they might have been saving their best players for most important games. He shot three pointers 8/21 in tournament. If that was not just fluke, his improved outside shot might make him also more valuable in half court sets.

[MikkeMan]

Yeah, Serbia is really fun to watch. Teodosic drives me crazy sometimes with his JJ-like hero ball, but he is a terrific shooter and does get his assists too. They are going to be tough to beat.

If you happen to run into Lauri (since I assume all Finns know each other :) ), remind him that there is a very good university on the banks of the mighty Mississippi in Minneapolis that would be happy to welcome him!

LST, unfortunately Finland is not that small country that I would know Lauri.:) I understood that he is selecting between those three schools mainly because his current coach (and mentor :) the only Finnish born NBA player Hanno Mottola played for Utah and his father Pekka played one year in Kansas when current UNC coach Roy Williams was coaching there. I guess Arizona is in his list just because good record from last years and they might have promised minutes for Lauri already in freshman year.