Greens and Reds are going for the sweep after their new wins

Euroleague’s Athens Final Four will astir apt person two Greek teams, arsenic Olympiakos and Panathinaikos are conscionable 1 win distant from clinching their spots successful the tournament’s showpiece, aft their caller triumphs successful Games 2 of their bid connected Thursday.

The Reds were a people supra Monaco and won comfortably 94-64 astatine the Peace and Friendship Stadium to pb the best-of-five bid 2-0.

The balanced archetypal 4th (28-23) was followed by a sweeping 2nd play for the hosts, who astatine times were similar men playing against boys. The partial 31-8 people practically settled the crippled from half-time (59-31), reducing the 2nd fractional to a specified formality successful what was astir most apt the last location crippled for Olympiakos successful Europe this season.

Sasha Vezenkov (21 points) and Evan Fournier (16) were the Reds’ top scorers connected the night, successful the beingness of Giannis Antetokounmpo.

Monaco’s Mike James was ejected with two technical fouls successful the archetypal fractional and helium whitethorn miss the adjacent crippled owed to his onslaught connected the lucifer officials.

The bid continues astatine Monaco connected Tuesday, May 5, and Olympiakos will beryllium forgiven for expecting a 3-0 sweep.

Panathinaikos worked very hard astatine Valencia and won Game 2 successful overtime with a 107-105 people and is besides starring 2-0.

The Greens lacked the borderline successful defence that gave them victory successful Game 1, and tried to lucifer their big successful gait and shooting rates. They did it for the full game, advancing 49-48 astatine half-time and threatening Valencia with a 2nd interruption successful 48 hours starring by 9 (80-71) aboriginal successful the last 4th with 15 unanswered points.

Valencia, that was the regular season’s runner-up down Olympiakos, worked its way backmost and sent the crippled to overtime (95-95).

However, the Greens’ astir caller signing, Nigel Hayes-Davis, was intolerable to incorporate successful overtime and scored the buzzer-beating winning handbasket to take his tally for the nighttime to 27 points. He was seconded by Kendrick Nunn with 19.

The best-of-five bid is present coming to Athens, with Game 3 scheduled for Wednesday, May 6.