MIES (Switzerland) - Promitheas Patras BC Vikos Cola needed stars to align on Tuesday night in Czechia, visiting ERA Nymburk and dreaming of making their way into the Play-Ins.
Thanks to Galatasaray putting the cherry on top of their second-place finish with a road win in Vechta, the Greek team got the job done by beating Francesco Tabellini's team.
Nymburk's winning streak is over
Promitheas was called to do the unprecedented feat in order to avoid elimination in this season's Basketball Champions League: beat ERA Nymburk, one of the best teams throughout the entire Regular Season.
Following a rough start that saw the hosts going up by 10 points, the black-and-orange Greek side responded perfectly, and never lost the lead until the final buzzer. They did it by being slightly better from the two-point range (61.1% vs 56.8%) and way better from beyond the arc (38.5% vs 22.2%).
To push his team to the ultimate 10-point road victory (85-75), Isaiah Reese stepped up big time by going close to a huge double-double with 20 points and 9 assists. Four more Promitheas' players (Kenny Williams, Jordon Varnado, Antonios Karagiannidis, and KJ Williams) ended in double-digits.
"First of all, we need to congratulate Nymburk for this series, they had qualified already and we have big respect for their game, but today is our day. We proved that from the beginning when we chased our possibilities to qualify. The reality is that I think nobody believed in us before this game, but we had faith and we transferred this faith to the players before the game," coach Ilias Papatheodorou was happy after the buzzer.
For the home side, it was yet again a good personal night for Christian Bishop, who finished with 17 points in a losing effort; Stephen Brown tried to keep up the team's tempo, finishing with 16 points and 4 assists.
Tuncer stepped up late for Galatasaray
Pushed by what looked like a home crowd in Vechta, Galatasaray confirmed their fate: they would have finished Group D in second place regardless of Tuesday's result against RASTA.
To make the red-and-yellow fans happy and cheer Cimbombom at the final buzzer, however, Yakup Sekizkok's team still got the job done by 10 points (74-64), as the hosts went on biting their nails with tension while waiting for ERA Nymburk to defeat Promitheas.
Despite not needing a win in the Rasta Dome Vechta, the experienced players stepped up for Galatasaray. Bugrahan Tuncer, for example, reserved his best scoring night of the BCL Regular Season for last, dropping 23 points.
Tuesday's encounter was the last for this season in the Basketball Champions League for the 2005-born Johann Grunloh, destined to be chosen in next year's NBA Draft. He didn't have the best of nights, with 2 points over 1-of-6 from the field. Tyger Campbell, instead, concluded his BCL rookie year with 19 points and 5 assists.
Following these results, ERA Nymburk as anticipated will skip the Play-In stage, directly qualifying for Group L of the Round of 16 where they will find Group H winners and the winners of two Play-In series (A2 vs B3 and F2 vs E3).
Regarding the rest of Group D, RASTA Vechta found themselves out of competition, at the bottom. Galatasaray celebrated the home-court advantage in the Play-Ins, where they will go up against the third-best team in Group C; Promitheas, instead, will start their next phase on the road, facing Group C's second-classified team.