By Dubi Pick
If I were to challenge myself to guess who’s more frustrated about his current situation, recently fired Zalgiris Kaunas head coach Ilias Zouros, or the team’s point guard, Ty Lawson, I’d go with the latter.
The Denver Nuggets’ exile blew off a lot of steam lately with a series of aggressive tweets, seemingly indicating he might be on his way home while bashing European basketball. A simple look at Lawson’s last four games clearly shows he hasn’t adjusted to the European style of play, failing to live up to expectations, dishing out only one assist in 72 minutes. At the moment, Zalgiris leads the domestic LKL (Lithuanian) League with a perfect 4-0 record, but Lawson “leads” a totally different rank in EuroLeague as he’s presently sitting rock bottom out of 200 players in the assists scale average with big fat zero over two games, which by the way, were losses.
Zouros was immediately fired after last week’s Euroleague home debut loss to Andrei Kirilenko’s CSKA Moscow, Zouros’ first and last Euroleague game in nine years since coaching Olympiacos in ’01. Zouros, who joined the Lithuanian team in January, led Zalgiris to the Lithuanian League, Lithuanian State-Cup and Baltic League titles. He was coming off a noteworthy summer EuroBasket campaign leading the Greek national team to a respectable 6th-place finish at Eurobasket, and was on a roll, winning his first three domestic league games with Zalgiris. But back-to-back losses in the VTB League, and a Euroleague opening night loss to CSKA, cost him his job.
A Lithuanian reporter who covers Zalgiris on a daily basis shed some light on what really went on behind the scenes.
“Zalgiris is a very strange team. Nearly two years ago, Lithuanian millionaire Vladimiras Romanovas bought the team, making it his official new toy. When Romanovas doesn’t like a certain result, he’ll search for someone better who he thinks can deliver. The Euroleague game coach Zouros lost to CSKA left him no chance of staying on board, and he clearly paid the price. Overall, Romanovas is a very strange individual and to be honest, no one in Lithuania really understands his decision making.”
On Tuesday night, Euroleague’s second week kicked off in Malaga, Spain, where Unicaja completed a daring second-half comeback, forcing overtime, in an 85-78 victory that sent Lawson, Sonny Weems and new coach Vitoldas Masalskis back to Lithuania with loads to think of.
Joel Freeland scored seven points in overtime and led Unicaja with 21 points and 12 rebounds. Latvian playmaker Kristaps Valters hit two money ball 3s in OT en route to scoring 20 points and dishing out a game-high seven assists, while Tremmell Darden finished with 10 points for the winners, who are currently the only team in the tough Spanish ACB to hold a perfect 4-0 record.
Weems continues to show he’s worthy of being on a European parquet floor, finishing with a team-high 21 points and right boards despite turning the ball over five times. Marko Popovic made all eight shots from the free-throw line in collecting 18 points, extending his streak of making at least one 3-pointer to 24 consecutive Euroleague appearances. Lawson finished with seven points and nine boards, but forgot he was the team’s point guard, finishing with no assists.
After a back-and-forth first quarter, Weems hit two 3s from way out as the visitors opened a 39-28 lead. Unicaja came clawing back as Valters connected from behind the arc on the first play of the second half. Tremmell Darden did the same,Gerald Fitch added a pair of free throws, Darden hit another triple and Luka Zoric attacked the rim to cap a 10-0 run, leaving Zalgiris shocked.
Popovic’s triple put Zalgiris ahead by 6, and instead of Javtokas making it an eight point game, former Toronto Raptors forward Jorge Garbajosa popped in a triple to cut the deficit in half. Weems (again) got to the line making it 61-54 with five minutes remaining. Joel Freeland and Berni Rodriguez quickly brought the hosts back within a single possession before Freeland’s monster jam shook the arena with Malaga taking a 61-60. Weems dribbled the ball off his own foot, but Malaga turned it over as well. Rodriguez managed to tie it up at 67-67, and a pair of bricks on both ends sent the game to overtime.
Popovic began the extra session with two successful free throws,Valters hit back-to-back 3s, and Lawson and Weems were nowhere to be found as the hosts used a 9-0 run to go ahead 76-69.