St. Petersburg and Yekaterinburg will host 2 regular season games on Wednesday.
Zenit (St. Petersburg) vs Pari Nizhny Novgorod (Nizhny Novgorod)
Time: 19:30 (Moscow time)
Place: Russia, St. Petersburg, CSC Arena
Broadcast: TV Start, League website
Zenit: The St. Petersburg team lost the rebounding, and 4 players of the starting five scored less than 50% of the shots from the game, which eventually led to the first loss of the season in the game against Loko (76:83). Now Zenit will face an equally important and difficult opponent – Pari NN made the first sensation of the regular season by defeating CSKA at home (77:75). Xavier Pascual team will need to fix the rebounding problems, as Nizhny is in the Top 3 in rebounds. But the offensive advantage will surely help the hosts, who outperform the opponent in all shooting stats.
Pari Nizhny Novgorod: Nizhny head to St. Petersburg in high spirits for several reasons: Sergey Kozin beat the Top-4 team for the first time as head coach, the team became the author of the first sensation of the season and got a chance to move up to second place in case of a win over Zenit. The game is sure to be tense, but Nizhny has a lot to offer against the St. Petersburg team star offense. The Volga team average 6 more rebounds than the opponent (40.2 vs. 34.2), and also lead the League in average steals (11.0 per game).
Uralmash (Yekaterinburg) vs PARMA (Perm Region)
Time: 19:30 (17:30 Moscow time)
Place: Russia, Ekaterinburg, GAUSO “Dvorets Igrovykh Vidov Sporta”
Broadcast: TV Start, League website
Uralmash: The first home game of the season for the team was fail – after struggling in the first half, the team lost the third quarter to UNICS 27:6, which was the reason for loss. Now Uralmash will have a chance to get into the Top 5 with the win over PARMA. Uralmash has 3 players averaging more than 15 points (Tyrell Nelson, Jeremiah Martin, Stanley Whittaker), while the Perm team has no such players. Team stats are also on the Yekaterinburg team side as has advantage in game-winning shots, rebounds, assists and steals.
PARMA: The Perm team confidently beat MBA-MAI at home (83:54), getting second home win of the season. Now the team will face the Ural derby, in case of win PARMA will enter the Top 6. The key to success against the positional basketball could be fastbreaks, which Evgeny Pashutin team organize well. Also, Uralmash continues to play without Octavius Ellis and Johnny O’Bryant, so Royce Hamm will again be able to help a lot. The пфьу will be especially important for Aleksandr Zakharov and Garrett Nevels, who played for the Yekaterinburg team last season.
