TUR - Siena beat Efes in OT; Panathinaikos rise from the dead to stun Partizan (+ Video)

ISTANBUL (Euroleague) - Montepaschi Siena won an overtime thriller at Efes Pilsen while Panathinaikos fought back from a 15-point deficit late in the third quarter to scrape a narrow win over Partizan Belgrade in Wednesday's Top 16 action.

In Istanbul, Turkey international power forward Ermal Kurtoglu had 20 points for Efes but Simone Piangiani's Mens Sana prevailed 79-76 with Bootsy Thornton pouring in a team-high 18 points, two of them on an acrobatic jump shot near the end of overtime to account for the final score.

David Blatt's Efes had fallen behind 74-69 in the extra period but reeled off seven consecutive points to lead 76-74.

Siena fouled Drew Nicholas while he was attempting a three and he made all three shots from the charity stripe, and Scoonie Penn followed with a three-ball before Andre Hutson split a pair of free throws in that 7-0 surge.

Lithuania national team star Ksistof Lavrinovic replied with two shots at the stripe to tie the contest, and then made one of two at the line to put them in front for good before Thornton's sensational shot finished the scoring.

Efes had three chances to tie the game before the end but missed them all.

Panathinaikos had lost their Top 16 opener to Efes last week but they bounced back to beat Partizan 67-65.

Zeljko Obradovic's men, who trounced Greek rivals Olympiacos at the weekend, had trailed 56-41 with 10 minutes remaining but stormed back to win with Greece international guard Vassilis Spanoulis scoring 20 points in the victory.

Interim boss Xavier Pascual was handed the coaching job at Barcelona on a permanent basis this week but he and his new team weren't able to follow up last week's victory over Unicaja Malaga with another win after falling 72-55 at CSKA Moscow.

The Russian giants had a close game on their hands until the final 10 minutes, when they outscored the Catalan side 24-12 for a decisive victory.

Australia international David Anderson led all scorers with 20 points and also finished with eight rebounds as CSKA improved to 2-0. They had won their opener last week against Lottomatica Roma in Moscow at the buzzer on a three-pointer from Trajan Langdon.

Lietuvos Rytas romped to an 89-74 home triumph over Aris to improve to 1-1 while the Thessaloniki outfit slipped to 0-2.

Mindaugas Lukauskis had a season-high 18 points and Chuck Eidson finished with the same tally in the victory for the Vilnius side.

The other game saw Tau Ceramica thrash Fenerbahce Ulker 103-84 in Vitoria.

Sergi Vidal and Croatia national team guard Zoran Planinic had 14 points apiece for Tau, while Fener dropped to 1-1.

On Thursday, Zalgiris Kaunas are at home to Maccabi Tel Aviv, Unicaja Malaga visit Lottomatica Roma and Olympiacos travel to face Real Madrid.

FIBA