EuroBasket - 2007 Qualification Pick

Written by Alleks

Wednesday, 06 September 2006

Russia - Czech Republic

Russia have injured Bykov and Chriapa. Both are very important for russian squad, but they did not play a lot of minutes in first 2 games, so their absense should not have big impact on team play.

Russian team trying to play very fast basketball with a lot of fast breaks and fast attacks. But the problem is that they still don't have form and experience. They have big holes in defence because it's very difficult to set a defence for new team and Blatt understand that's why he decided to rely on offense in this qualification round. But general Russian can hold their opponents in 70-75 points range if they don't shoot 3 pointers with 60% effort like Belgium did in their last game. In offense they scoring about 84.5 points in last 7 games, but in general this team can score 85+ points easily, especially in full gym with 7000 spectators (they will play in Molot Arena and tickets are sold already)

Czechs played 2 games and scored 20+ points in 7 of 8 quarters. By the way they would score 20+ points in that 8 quarter too if they would not forget where the basket is located in first 2 minutes in their game vs Hungary. Seems that this team offensive performance should be about 78-82 points, while in defense they are allowing about 75 points in average 73 points.

So what do we have.. We have both teams that can score 75+ points easily and in first 2 games they did not show any kind of magic in defence. Fast tempo + good individual skills + full fym + average defence = Over 154.5.

Predicted score: Russia 86 - 79 Czech Republic

Pick: Over 154.5 (medium-high confidence, more to high)

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