Ventspils goes to Thessaloniki to fight for an important victory

The current situation in the F group is the following. There are two teams who have already guaranteed themselves a place in the EuroCup round, but three teams are fighting for the last two places – PAOK, “Buducnost” and BK “Ventspils”. The first two are in better situation, though, but also Ventspils chances are not only theoretical. With four victories (now though only two) Ventspils can pull ahead of not only Greeks, but also Montenegrins and finish the tournament in the third place, but not finishing the tournament with two victories, move to the next round is hardly likely.

The easiest scenario is two losses for “Buducnost” and two victories for us, but Ventspils can live with sharing the pass to the next round with PAOK – but in this case Latvians need a victory with at least +4. But the main thing that Latvians should keep in mind – that the only possible results after these two remaining games are victories.

At the first game in Ventspils Greeks celebrated victory beating the hosts by three – 66:63. After the game Mire Chatman took the blame because rushed with the assists during the last offence play, but the saddest part of that game, though, was the shooting percentage. Hosts made just 22 shots from the game (2p 16/45, 3p 6/17), and foul shooting percentage was less than 50% (11/23). Ventspils did everything it could to end its plays with a basket but the ball wasn’t going in even when shot from under the basket … It meant – that despite playing good in the defence BK “Ventspils” lost that game. Probably, it was the toughest loss in tournament.

After the game in Ventspils have not exactly been on a victory high. Yes, PAOK celebrated a victory over Montenegro’s “Buducnost” but then lost three games in a row – becoming the co-authors of the first “Stelmet” victory. While in the national championship there have been two victories and two losses. Another major loss for the team is the career-ending injury of team captain Kostas Haralampidis.

But PAOK has already found his substitute – with a great experience who is also well known by Latvians – 34-years-old American guard Ernest Bremer. Last year he played for Gaziantep “Royal Hali” that played in EuroChallenge Cup and thus faced BK “Ventspils” in one of the rounds. Few seasons before that he played for “Nizhny Novgorod” who also played against Ventspils in EuroChallenge Cup. For Bremer it will be some sort of a homecoming to PAOK because he represented this Greek team in 2007 but transferring to Bosnian “Bosna” at the end of that season.
There are no doubts that BK “Ventspils” players know the price and the importance of this game so it is very important to catch the find the game rhythm. Up until now the EuroCup games at the “PAOK Sport Arena”, that has 8500 seats, have not been exactly sold out. For the game against “Buducnost” there were 1600 spectators in the stands while last week – against the “Lokomotiv” – just 500! Of course, it can also be the other way round because of Bremer’s return, besides with a victory in this game PAOK can already guarantee itself a place in the next round of the EuroCup but Ventspils will do everything to prevent this from happening.