Panathinaikos interested in Ilievski

He is the ideal addition for them.


Panathinaikos are interested in Vlado Ilievski(1.90-PG) according to zurnal24.si. Panathinaikos tried to buy Ilievski back in February but Olimpija denied their bid as Ilievski was one of the most vital players for them. This situation hasn't changed for now but who knows what happens next season. Ilievski would have complemented the frontcourt of Panathinaikos perfectly, especially now they're ailing in the point guard position.

Ilievski said that he wants to stay in Olimpija, which is all well and good as he is playing the Euroleague and he is also the starting point-guard but if there is a good bid in the summer who knows what's going to happen. Now that Ilievski said that Panathinaikos are interested in him I wouldn't be surprised if he ends up in Olympiakos instead.

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Aris dismissed Thomas, 2 centers to follow

If the flip-flop flies...


Rumor has it that John Thomas(2.06-C) launched a flip-flop against his head coach Slobodan Subotic and in an act of defiance left the video screening and subsequently the team. Regardless of the reason Aris BC are going to file a case against Thomas' contract in the league and the team announced via their official website that the American veteran is no longer a player of the team.

The announcement only mentions a disciplinary offense but it's no secret that Thomas wanted to leave the team so now he got his chance. Perhaps though not on the terms that he would have wanted. Perhaps a team in Israel could be his next stop.

In Aris they're thinking of the next day and are waiting patiently on the end of the Adriatic League Final Four to see if they can sign Marko Skekic(2.07-PF/C). His agent told basketblog.gr that they would be very much interested in signing with Aris but it's up to Buducnost to release the player after the Final Four. The assistant coach of Aris BC Thanassis Papachatzis spoke to arisfm.gr and he said that the team will be signing 2 centers. However none of them will play in the last game of the regular season against Ikaros tomorrow.

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Olympiakos looking for a center

Or how now to waste player changes.


In Olympiakos they wasted their 2 player changes for the season swapping players from their existing roster around and now that their most important big man is injured, they seem to be running out of options. The cases of players that fit the bill are numbered. And to make matters even worse, the injury of Radoslav Nesterovic(2.13-C) will keep him out of the Greek Cup final as well.

Mavroeidis(2.09-C) is bound by contract with Bilbao for 2 more seasons and it's unlikely they'll release him for nor love or money but hey, stranger things have happened. The same goes for Alexei Savrasenko(2.13-C) who has played for Olympiakos in the past and he is the owner of a Greek passport. However.. Khimki might not be so willing to release him and it's uncertain what is the status of his Greek passport. To make things clear Nesterovic also has a Greek passport but not all of his "affairs" with the Greek state are in order so he had to be declared as a Slovenian player instead.

Lazaros Papadopoulos(2.13-C) has played for Ivkovic in the past with success but he can't play again in Greece as he has already played for Paok. Kostas Koufos(2.13-C) is still in the NBA play-offs with the Denver Nuggets and after the Printezis debacle, it's improbable that Malaga will release him. Printezis is not a center but he could help in the PF position.

All this wouldn't have happened if the technical staff of Olympiakos hadn't thrown away 2 foreign player changes  in the 2nd round of the Greek league and now they can't even bring Matt Nielsen back. There is also one more case that hadn't been mentioned of Jake Tsakalidis(2.18-C) but it seems that he's dropped off the face of the earth and has probably quit basketball altogether. So it seems now that Andreas Glyniadakis(2.15-C) will be re-activated and he doesn't have much time to adapt within the team and help out Bouroussis who will be the starting center of Olympiakos.

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Bauermann scouting for.. Bagaric

He came to see first hand.

Dirk Bauermann was spotted in Maroussi according to basketnet.gr and he didn't come just to see the game but to check out the veteran giant Dalibor Bagaric(2.17-C). Bagaric found his niche in Maroussi and revamped his career with some impressive figures in Greece and that didn't go unnoticed. Rumor has it that he rejected offers from Spanish teams to stay in Maroussi but it's very unlikely he will be there next season as well.

Maroussi is a little miracle in itself this season where the team was systematically led to extinction by the unwillingness of its former administration to participate but it was rescued at the very last moment and they put together a rag tag team of former veterans, young hopefuls and unknown players to the European crowds. One of these veterans was Bagaric who found himself comfortably tall amongst the lacking front-lines of the rest of the Greek teams. It seems that the recession did actually favor him. The article implies that Bagaric is a potential target for next season's Bayern Munich and their BBL debut. Bagaric has averaged so far 12 points 8.6 rebounds and 1.6 blocks in 17 games in Greece.

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The Printezis debacle

Or how not to negotiate a contract release..


It seems that Giorgos Printezis(2.05-PF) was very lucky when he signed one of the most illustrious contracts in the Euroleague earning 1.2 million euros per season. And for that he had to thank his agent mostly and not his own performance. He'd never make that kind of money back in his homeland and he knew that very well.

Now he is well into his 2nd season and he's yet to justify all that money that the administration of Malaga are injecting into his account. He has after the highest contract in the team and that may come as a shock to some people. It's as if he is tenaciously trying to rekindle the negative tradition of Lazaros Papadopoulos(2.13-C) in his days in Real Madrid. But there was light at the end of the tunnel and Olympiakos decided to bring back the prodigal son. But then it all went wrong again.

According to gazzetta.gr, the deal went sour for 100,000 euros. On Wednesday, Printezis was getting ready to get on a plane and return to Athens. He even said his goodbyes to his teammates in Malaga but to no avail. Just a few days later and he was back. Malaga were ready to give Printezis on a loan agreement to Olympiakos until the end of the season but there was also the matter of his next season contract. On Friday Malaga were giving Printezis 500,000 euros as compensation for next season but through his agent he asked for more money. So on Monday they came back with a better offer for 600,000 euros but that still wasn't enough for Printezis and his agent. They also asked for the April's salary which is another 100,000 euros on top of the 600,000.  Needless to say that the people of Malaga retracted their offer and now Printezis is sidelined and he could be sidelined for the entire next season as well.

It just goes to show that sometimes you must know when to stop.. so no Olympiakos for Printezis and possibly no basketball for quite some time.

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Lietuvos Rytas and Trifunovic parted ways

Beating Panathinaikos wasn't enough to save Trifunovic.


The poor performance in the Baltic Basketball League (BBL) Final Four in Kaunas, where Lietuvos Rytas lost to VEF Riga in the semi-final and had a lot of trouble against Ventspils in the bronze-medal game, cost the team’s coach Aleskandar Trifunovic his job.

After an abysmal showing at the weekend, the 43-year-old Serbian specialist got the sack and will be replaced Darius Maskoliunas, who previously was Trifunovic’s assistant.

Lietuvos Rytas had a very unsuccessful stretch of games lately, losing not only to their biggest rivals Zalgiris, but also to smaller teams such as Rudupis in LKL and VEF in the BBL. If that wasn’t enough, the Lithuanian champions only barely escaped a defeat to Ventspils, winning by only four points.

Trifunovic had worked in Lietuvos Rytas before, but under his supervision the club won only one trophy despite playing fairly well throughout the Serb’s reign in 2006-2008 seasons.

The newly appointed coach Maskoliunas joined Lietuvos Rytas’ coaching staff in October, coming from KK Kaunas, against whom the 40-year-old Lithuanian coach will make his debut as Lietuvos Rytas’ head coach on Tuesday.


source : lithuaniabasketball.com

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Papaloukas to stay one more season in Olympiakos?

Theo Papaloukas has not said his final word.


According to basketblog.gr, Theo Papaloukas(2.00-PG) has decided to play one more season in Olympiakos and he also decided to seriously drop his salary requirements. It is to be expected as he is the highest paid player of the team with a salary close to 3 million euros. The article also says that Papaloukas has already discussed with Elias Zouros, the new head coach of the Greek National Team, the prospect of playing for the National Team and his wish is to be with the team all the way until the 2012 London Olympics.

Papaloukas took a year off the National Team and there were many people that decided to write him off so to say. He rested during the summer so he returned in quite good form despite his age. So far he has averaged 5.4 points 2.6 rebounds and 3.8 assists in 18 games in the Euroleague and also 6.3 points 2.3 rebounds and 4 assists in 18 games in the Greek A1 league.


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Zvonko Buljan to sign with Paok

Paok strengthening the front-line for the play-offs.



In Paok they see it as a great opportunity to secure the 3rd place in the regular season which will give them very good chances to secure the 3rd place in the play-offs as well. So they decided to add another player to their front-line and according to sportnet.gr it will be Croatian prospect Zvonko Buljan(2.06-PF/C) who started the season in Cyprus.

Buljan graduated in 2010 from the Texas Cristian University where he played for the Frogs. In his first pro season he played for Apoel in Cyprus and also in the Eurochallenge. He averaged 10.8 points and 7.7 rebounds in 6 games in the Eurochallenge and also 11.3 points and 7.3 rebounds in 12 games in Cyprus.He should be arriving in Greece tomorrow.

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NBA teams interested in Stanko Barac

You can never have enough 7-footers.


Stanko Barac(2.17-C) spoke to acb.com and said that although he has a contract with Baskonia in 2015 there is interest from teams from the NBA franchise as well. This means that the Croatian center might be leaving Baskonia in the summer for an NBA team. This is not news as Barac was selected by the Miami Heat as the 39th overall pick in the 2007 NBA Draft and was traded to the Indiana Pacers.

Last season he signed his 3-season extension with Baskonia but as always in these cases there is an NBA-out clause in his contract. If this happens Baskonia will be losing a 3rd big man to an NBA team after Scola and Splitter but obviously Barac is not of the same caliber. So far he has averaged 11.4 points and 5.3 rebounds in 20 games in the Euroleague and also 11.2 points and 6.9 rebounds in the ACB in 25 games.

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Gecevski out, Tskitishvili in?

He wants his monies!


Todor Gecevski(2.11-PF/C) might not be returning to Paok after all. The player is at his hometown in Skopje and the only reason he might be retuning to Greece would be to report a bounced cheque for 30,000 euros that he received from Paok. According to basketblog.gr, the Greek team are already looking for a replacement and that might be Georgian forward/center Nikoloz Tskitishvili(2.11-PF/C) who has been in playing in the ACB for San Sebastian Gipuzkoa averaging 5.3 points and 2.6 rebounds in 24 games.

Geveski has been one of the cornerstones of Paok in this season averaging 10.3 points and 5.9 rebounds in 23 games in the A1 league and his presence had been invaluable especially after the departure of Papadopoulos. Noone knows what's going to happen in the end but rumors say Gecevski is not very happy that Paok recently signed Dionte Christmas(1.96-SG/SF) giving up money upfront, whereas he is still waiting for his.

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