Greece looking for lucky breaks

DEBRECEN (EuroBasket Women 2015) - Injuries are part of the lottery of basketball. Sometimes you get the roll of the rim. On occasion, an unlucky bounce.

When Styliani Kaltsidou sustained an ACL injury in her knee in 2012 while playing for French club Bourges, it was a stunning blow. But for it to happen again, exactly 12 months later, in the other knee? Fortune might not feel like your friend.

Now healthy again but with the surgical scars as a reminder, the 32-year-old forward is back on the run at EuroBasket Women 2015 for a Greece team which has scrapped and scraped its way into the Second Round.

I'm just happy to be back from the injuries and to be able to be here. - Kaltsidou

"It is really nice for me, being back with the national team, playing in this competition, it's something I really missed and I'm having a lot of fun," she said.

It took a fight to return, to get through the months of rehabilitation before regaining fitness, to deal with the days when the boredom of not being able to experience the simple joy of completing a lay-up with ball in hand set in.

When the first tear occurred, it was a shock to the system, mentally as much as physically.

"I didn't know what would happen," Kaltsidou recalled. "How long I'd be out for, whether it would be six months or more. But the second one, I was calmer because I knew what I had to do.

"I knew I had to do A, B, C to get back. I'd already been there. Sure, I was shocked it happened again but it's part of what comes with the job: injuries. As long as it's something you can recover from, it's ok. I've seen players with things they can't come back from. An ACL now is nothing."

It wasn't quite so simple at the time. Players are used to the routine. It is now 13 seasons since the Tarbes recruit made her debut in European club competition but there were years of grind before that, of daily practice, games, off-season workouts, time in the gym.

Take that away, destroy the schedule, and it is a step out of the comfort zone.

"It was just the unknown that made me mad," Kaltsidou smiles. "What's happening? Will I get back to where I was? Will I get back to the same level? That's all I wanted.

"There were periods when I was down. My knee was up and down so naturally I was up and down mentally. But I just focused on really wanting to be back to where I was. Most players have come through hard times so I can't complain too much."

Hence she is relishing the second chance her in Romania. Greece is a statistical aberration. Prior to their free-scoring win over the Czech Republic on Friday, they ranked last in the tournament in scoring, averaging just 51.8 points per game. However, they were also second in points allowed, at  58.0.

Making the Second Round was a fine accomplishment. Progressing further was to be supposed to be a major shock.

But still, they are trying, with a stifling defense that has posed problems for every opponent, a swarm of bees with a sting in the tail.

That is, Kaltsidou declared, what we can call The Greek Way. And if they can beat Montenegro on Sunday, it might even see them into the Quarter-Finals.

"It's like this throughout the whole national team, from the lowest ages to us," she explained. "We are a country where we don't have the tall and athletic bodies like France or some others here. So we need to be smart. We can only win by defense.

"It's not because we are strong physically. We have to confuse the opponent with tricks to steal games. We have heart and passion. Everybody knows Greeks are passionate. So we must use every weapon we have because we know we need to go 100% to get a win here."

By making their own luck.

Go to EuroBasketWomen2015.com for full coverage of EuroBasket Women 2015.

FIBA