Nizhny Novgorod, St. Petersburg and Moscow will host regular season games on Wednesday.
Pari Nizhny Novgorod (Nizhny Novgorod, Russia) vs Avtodor (Saratov, Russia)
Time: 19:00 (Moscow time)
Palce: Russia, Nizhny Novgorod, KRK Nagorniy
Broadcast: Match! Igra, Start Triumph, League website
Pari Nizhny Novgorod: Nizhny Novgorod decline continued against Loko. Pari NN lost already in the first quarter as Zoran Lukic said. Loko really quickly created a double-digit lead, which Nizhny could not recover. The Volga team had their worst offensive game of the season, scoring only 64 points: the American players combined for 4 assists on 22 attempted shots and Andrey Vorontsevich actions were not enough. With this loss, Nizhny losing streak has now reached 4 games, putting them outside the Top 8. The game against the team from the bottom of the standings is very important as the team has a challenging schedule ahead and need to improve their place now.
Avtodor: Although the Saratov team ended the losing streak in the Volga derby against Samara and can breathe easier, the team is still second from the bottom. Avtodor needs a win no less than Nizhny, as Milenko Bogicevic team has games against Zenit and Loko. However, the game against UNICS showed that the Saratov team is gradually recovering – Avtodor only team who not allowed the Kazan team to score 90 points on the road. In the game against Samara, a solid offensive effort (56% from the game) and domination on rebounds added to a solid performance, which immediately led to a positive result. The game with Nizhny is unlikely to be very scoring – the cost of a mistake is high and the teams will probably play a cautious game.
Zenit (St. Petersburg, Russia) vs. PARMA (Perm, Russia)
Time: 19:30 (Moscomw time)
Place: Russia, St. Petersburg, KSC Arena.
Broadcast: League website
Zenit: In a super-game between the last two League champions, Zenit suffered their 4th loss in 8 games. Despite that, Zenit can still take the game into their favour. Xavier Pascual team played without 5 key players, including Thomas Heurtel, Georgy Zhbanov, Adrien Moermann and Sergey Toropov. The bigmen absence was perhaps the key factor in the game – although Vince Hunter fought like a last time, Zenit problems untied UNICS frontcourt, where Ismael Bako is increasingly making a name for himself. But even in such a exhausted position, the St. Petersburg team gave the reigning champion a hard-fought battle that lasted until the last seconds of the game. So Zenit can be considered the favourite against PARMA.
PARMA: The Perm team is still alternating winning with losing. Although the team have just one less win than Zenit, PARMA looks less stable. Evgeny Pashutin has the largest 5-point win against MINSK, and so far PARMA hasn’t won 2 games in a row. Despite the team generally good defensive effort, PARMA has had constant trouble in defending opponent’s scoring leaeder: this was the case with Casper Ware, Jeremiah Hill, and, of course, the fantastic Xavier Rathan-Mayes, who scored 42 points in 30 minutes. Zenit may not have such a flashy scorer, but Trent Frazier and Kyle Kuric can cause PARMA frontcourt a lot of troubles.
CSKA (Moscow, Russia) vs Samara (Samara, Russia)
Time: 20:00 (Moscow time)
Place: Russia, Moscow, Megasport
Broadcast: Start Triumph, League website
CSKA: The Moscow team is the sole leader and the only undefeated team in the League so far. While CSKA lacked a little bit of lightness at the start of the season, CSKA has been unleashing the full offenisve force in the last 4 games. It’s hard for the team’s opponents to adapt with CSKA roster, where any player can show himself. For example, Samson Ruzhentsev was the highest scorer against Avtodor, Casper Ware against PARMA, and Livio Jean-Charles set a career-high in the League with 26 points. The French center showed his career-high (25 points) in the game against Samara last sesason.
Samara: After a sensational win over UNICS, Samara slightly slowed down, got 2 losses in a row. While the loss against Loko can be explained by the Krasnodar team was overcame the early season crisis, the loss to Avtodor was particularly sensitive – at that point, the Saratov team had only 1 win in 7 games.Samara coach Drazen Anzulovic noted that his team occasionally lacked concentration – perhaps the fact that Avtodor was the underdog had an impact. However, it seems that offensive problems that Samara had in this game only psychological – the Volga team is among the leaders in assists, but against Avtodor the team made only 11 assists, while having 13 turnovers. In any case, there’s no way the Volga team can be in a giving up mood against CSKA.
