Unics vs Hapoel Jerusalim

Unics Kazan playing at home and seeking revenge for 39 points loss in Jerusalim (68:107). Players for sure remember than match and will try to answer at home. Situation now is completely different. Unics have D.Lavrinovic back in the roster, under new coach team won 6 of 7 games and finaly Unics started to play better on the court. There are still many things to work but I feel that this game is more than regular match for Kazan. Also it's very important for Unics to win at least with 15-20 pts difference to get advantage over Hapoel and Strasbourg if these teams will be tied at the end of group stage (right now it's very probable scenario) so it's worth to expect high motivation from Kazan today.

On other side we have Hapoel which lost all away games this year in all competitions. They fired Marcus Slaughter, J.Arnold is recovering after surgery and Noel Felix was signed. But Hapoel played last game on December, 18 and this could be a factor because 3 weeks without official game can hurt any game. By the way Unics played on December 18, 21, 23 and January 2nd with Dynamo Moscow (friendly). So russian team should be in better shape and with better motivation.

I expect Unics to win with double digit margin and would not be surprised to see 20+ win. But it's still early to trust Unics and handicap looks quite solid so only medium-low stakes are adviced.

Pick: Unics (-10.5) @ 1.95 PinancleSports 3/10

Koln - Ventspils
Ventspils is not so good team to have 2.20 away from home against one of the German teams. Koln started this season very bad but now they are looking much better. After 15-points loss to Ventspils Koln won 9 of 10 games and lost only to strong Besiktas at home. Seems that loss to Besiktas still have some weight in this line but Ventspils is not the same class team as Besiktas. I have seen Ventspils against Zalgiris 2 weeks ago and it was very bad game. Too much individual efforts and bad team play. Also Ventspils is not so stable team as ULEB Cup table shows it's enough to check Baltic League table where Ventpspils have only 5 wins in 12 games. And most of the teams in that leagues are weaker than Koln.

All in one, I expected to see 5.5-6 pts handicap for Koln but when bookmakers ruled out 1.70 for Koln to win I decided to take it, because fair odds according to my estimations should be around 1.4-1.45 on Koln.

Pick: Koln @ 1.70 PinnacleSports 4/10

Strasbourg - PGE Turow Zgorzelec
Turow have nothing to play for in France. They already clinched play off spot and Strasbourg needs to win this one to stay in promotion battle. Strasbourg is showing good results in last games (5 wins in row in LNB league) and also they all 3 games at home this season in ULEB Cup. Strasbourg is strong home team and with higher motivation and full roster should be capable of winning against Polish team which is overestimated in the line because of their table positions.

In my opinion fair odds should be 1.35-2.90 but not 1.65-2.42 as Pinnacle currently have.

Pick: Strasbourg (-2.5) @ 1.85 PinnacleSports 4/10