Barcelona-Olympiacos: The preview of Game 1 of the Playoffs – Basketball – Euroleague – Olympiacos Basketball

For the first time since the implementation of the new format in EuroleagueThe Olympic will start the Playoffs with a home field advantage.

The “red and white” face her Barcelona (22:00, www.sportfm.gr, bwinSPORT FM 94.6, Novasports Prime), at “Palau Blaugrana”, in the first match between the series.

The two teams have a very long history in the competition, having met in all phases, from group stage and regular season to Final Four finals. From then on, both finished the EuroLeague regular season with the same record, i.e. in 22-12however the “blaugrana” this year have done it 2/2 against Piraeus and that’s why they ended 4th and the “red and white” respectively 5th. In the first round, the Catalans prevailed 77-68 in the SEF and the second with a score 86-78in Barcelona.

From here on, the Olympic made an excellent final stretch in the EuroLeague regular season, tallying ten wins in eleven games. The last obligation of the “red and white” before the trip to the capital of Catalonia was for the Stoiximan Basket League, where they hosted the Prometheus of Patras and they defeated him comfortably 80-69. In that match, he got the first minutes of participation after the injury of o Philip Petrushevwhich is now calculated normally.

However, the preparation of Piraeus did not end in the best way. Out of mission was left Kostas Papanikolaou, as he is suffering from a virus and was unable to travel. In the meantime, he will play with a problem Thomas Walkupas in the last few days he suffered from discomfort in the back.

On the other hand, Barcelona completed the regular season with a 76-72 away loss to Villeurbanne. For the “blaugrana”, two matches for the Spanish championship followed, where they won the same number of victories, initially prevailing 81-75 in Girona and then her 97-86 Murthy.

On the plus side for him Roger Grimmow is that he is counting on all his players, as he is back in full swing and Willie Hernangomethwho has been out lately.

The referees of the match will be Damir Javor (Croatia), Tomislav Hordov (Croatia) and Rein Peerati (Estonia).

The program of the series in detail:

Game 1 (24/4, 22:00) Barcelona-Olympiacos
Game 2 (26/4, 22:00) Barcelona-Olympiacos
Game 3 (30/4, 21:30) Olympiacos-Barcelona
Game 4 (if necessary 2/5, 19:45) Olympiacos-Barcelona
Game 5 (if needed 8/5) Barcelona-Olympiacos