EuroLeague Women - Week 2 Review

MUNICH (EuroLeague Women) - Women's basketball specialist Paul Nilsen reflects on the latest round of the 2015-16 EuroLeague Women season.

The history makers
It wasn't exactly easy on the eye and far from a classic encounter, but the accomplishment of Spar CityLift Girona in recording an historic first-ever success in the competition was tremendous. It took nerves to squeeze past Wisla Can-Pack 62-60 and while Miguel Angel Ortega and his players rode their luck, it proved to be a memorable night at Pavello Fontaju.

Girona weren't able to field the newly signed Naignouma Coulibaly, but still dug out a famous result and it was good to see Greek national team forward Artemis Spanou get her first double-double in the tournament. Her boxing out for 11 defensive rebounds in her final tally of 12 was so very precious indeed.

Interestingly Girona now have an opportunity to follow it up with a game on the road at Castors Braine. After that, they have a trip to Kayseri to face Agu Spor Kulubu and then the not so small matter of back-to-back games against last year's finalists, UMMC Ekaterinburg and ZVVZ USK Prague.

Yes, as the party subsides in Girona - reality will bite. There are some hugely difficult challenges ahead, but getting a maiden victory at least gives something very positive to now build on for the newcomers.

Spreading the win wealth
While Week 2 was never going to quite live up to the extraordinary events of the first night of the season, it did have a theme of so many clubs showing their bouncebackability.

Five teams who went down last week all successfully recovered to open their respective accounts and that means that just two weeks into the campaign, 15 of the 18 participants already have a win chalked on the board. That bodes very well for a competitive season ahead and an epic scramble for the Play-Off positions.

My weekly gongs
Team performance of the week: I could have handed it to Agu Spor yet again for their guts in seeing off Castors Braine without Odyysey Sims or her replacement Temeka Johnson, as well as Spar CityLift Girona turning an historic page - or even Perfumerias Avenida for a great win against the in-form Villeneuve d'Ascq. But, I actually think that Galatasaray beating a classy team like Dynamo Kursk when they were in real danger of potentially going 0-2 was very impressive. They did such a good job of keeping the Kursk frontcourt quiet and so congratulations to Ekrem Memnun and his players.
Individual performance of the week: I am going for Gabriela Marginean of Perfumerias Avenida. She carries a huge chunk of responsibility on her shoulders to provide the firepower and when Avenida really did need it, she came up with 24 points via 63% shooting display.
Unsung hero: Noemi Jordana celebrated her 32nd birthday last week and the belated gift of Girona's first win was well deserved for someone who is the heart and soul of the club. Her 10 points and eight assists were only part of the story, as it was the leadership and control of just two turnovers in almost 37 minutes of court time when under real pressure that mattered.
Rising star: Having only just turned 21-years-old and playing in only her second ever EuroLeague Women game under difficult circumstances with struggling Uniqa Sopron, the display by Bernadett Hatar didn't fly under my radar. The center who turned heads at EuroBasket Women 2015 with her potential, had 10 points from 4-of-5 floor shooting in just 11 minutes of court time on the road at Schio.

Footnotes
When your best players lose their range and draw blanks, then it is tough as a coach to do anything else but simply accept it was a bad day at the office. There were striking similarities in two of the games this week, as firstly Maros Kovacik watched Zuzana Zirkova, Barbora Balintova and Zsofia Hruscakova go a stone-cold 0-of-23 in a heavy loss at Fenerbahce, while Frederic Dusart watched his Villeneuve d'Ascq big-hitters struggle in a disappointing loss at Avenida. Virginie Bremont, Styliani Kaltsidou and Marielle Amant were 0-of-14. It is jaw-dropping that on a given night, those six quality players with major competition experience could not make a shot between them and be a combined 0-of-37! In fact, it is one of the most mind-boggling stats I have ever seen covering EuroLeague Women in recent years.

Big credit to Nadezhda Orenburg for going 14-0 down at the start of the game against UMMC but hauling themselves back into the game and even taking the lead. While they ran out of gas as Sandrine Gruda came alive to hand the win for UMMC, it was a good sign for the hosts.

Go to www.fibaeurope.com/euroleaguewomen for full coverage of the EuroLeague Women.

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