It was never going to match the drama of Round 1 but Round 2 of EuroLeague action still provided plenty of excitement while solidifying what teams should be worried and what teams should be optimistic. Some teams are surprisingly 2-0, and others are on the flip side of that.
After each week of EuroLeague action, we'll bring you the winners and losers of the week (here's last week). Here's a breakdown of Round 2 of EuroLeague action.
EuroLeague winners: We were wrong about Barcelona
We had Barcelona 12th in our pre-season EuroLeague power rankings and so far that prediction seems, to put it lightly, dumb. We're going to take victory laps on plenty of predictions throughout the season but don't worry, we'll never hesitate to point out what we got wrong too.
Our concerns about Barcelona were simple: they lost arguably the best offensive player in Europe in Nikola Mirotic, brought in a new head coach who is the exact opposite of previous head coach Sarunas Jasikevicius and didn't bring in anyone who seemed capable of providing a solution to the Mirotic sized scoring hole on their roster.
Roger Grimau has found that solution, though. Starting with Argentinian point guard Nicolas Laprovittola. The 2019 Liga ACB MVP has always been a player who dazzles, who makes something out of nothing, a player whose dimes are worthy of Walt Frazier's rhymes, and who shouldn't be shackled by his head coach like he was at times under Jasikevicius.
Grimau has freed Laprovittola and much of Barcelona's offense for that matter. Laprovittola holds the keys and is currently boasting a higher usage rate this season (25.75) than last season (22.46) in EuroLeague play. He's capitalizing on this as well, averaging more assists (7.5 per game this season versus 4.6 last season) and points (15 per game this season versus 10.4 last season).
Something that has worked well is that Grimau is putting Laprovittola off the ball, often having him play at the same time as Tomas Satoransky or Rokas Jokubaitis. Laprovittola starts the offensive set off-ball and runs his defender through a series of screens or off a longer curl and into a handoff regularly.
With his defender, and essentially the entire opposing defense, already in motion by the time he's got the ball Laprovittola has a huge advantage. You'll see in a couple of those clips that Barcelona successfully cleared an entire side of the court to let Laprovittola run a two-man game with Jan Vesely or Willy Hernangomez.
For now, this is borderline unguardable. Teams will adjust defensively as the season goes on and we'll see how Barcelona counters but through the first two rounds, they look like a certified Final Four team.
EuroLeague winners: Valencia have a strong taste of veterans resolve
There were concerns about Valencia and head coach Alex Mumbru heading into this season due to the rough opening schedule they have. The only positive to opening the season with Monaco, Fenerbahce, and then Maccabi is that all three games are at home. That being said, somehow managing to win two of these games would be viewed as a great start and they've already done that by grinding out narrow victories by five points and three points over AS Monaco and Fenerbahce respectively.
Neither win was easy. Valencia trailed Monaco by eight late in the third quarter and weathered several Fenerbahce comebacks and even saw themselves fall behind for the first time with two minutes to go against the Turkish club after leading by as much as 15.
This team is savvy though, and they've got veteran resolve. They opt for patience over panic and understand victories in EuroLeague are a non-linear process that requires a lot of preparation, execution, and even luck. Maybe they've primarily been lucky through two games, but so far we're confident what we're seeing is the real deal.
This is the best defensive team in the league so far, giving up an average of only 69.5 points per game is the top mark through two rounds of play. Yes, it's only two rounds, but they faced AS Monaco and Fenerbahce who have the same core teams as they did last season where they averaged 82.3 and 82.8 points per game respectively.
Their defensive prowess should not be surprising. Semi Ojeleye, Damien Inglis, Nathan Reuvers, and Victor Claver have solid versatility on this end of the floor. They're comfortable defending in the post or out on the perimeter. Centers Brandon Davies and Boubacar Traore defend the rim well.
Davies in particular is not an elite shot blocker by any stretch, but he primarily serves — as does Traore — as an additional deterrent on drives. Few opposing players are attacking the rim against Valencia without a body on them, already making things difficult. At the rim, they meet Traore or Davies size.
Their guards — Chris Jones, Kassius Robertson, Stefan Jovic, and Josep Puerto — navigate screens well and use their length and speed to disrupt opponents. They are active, and all are excellent at quickly getting out of situations where they are at a disadvantage.
By working together, they have limited Mike James and Elie Okobo combined for an 11-of-26 night from the field. Fenerbahce's backcourt options combined to shoot 15-of-36 against Valencia in Round 2. Opponents are shooting 31.5 percent from beyond the arc across two rounds. This defense is working in perfect harmony at the moment. The communication is clear, there is confidence in their connectivity, and their execution is exquisite.
On offense, their patience stands out. It's not just that they're making the right passes but that they know these opportunities will come. Davies, Inglis, Ojelye, and others have refused to be rushed whether catching the ball on the interior or the perimeter. Their vision and trust in the best shot possible eventually becoming available is impressive.
So far, Monaco and Fenerbahce have not had an answer for Valencia's fluid offense. Mumbru is excelling at creating advantages in every game. He's used Puerto in the post against smaller guards, he's set up Inglis and Davies to play a two-man high-low game, and he's still got the Jones pick-and-roll when he wants things to be simple. Valencia is off to a strong start, and they need to be respected as a playoff-level squad, especially at home.
EuroLeague winners: Bologna bounces back
The most shocking result of the week was easily Bologna's 24-point blowout road victory over Monaco. We'll have more on Monaco's side of this shortly, but Bologna deserves a lot of credit. In their home opener against Zalgiris, they blew two double-digit leads and suffered a fourth-quarter collapse that put this squad's largest weaknesses under a microscope.
Heading on the road to Monaco for Round 2 had blowout defeat written all over it. Monaco suffered a first-round loss to Valencia and were expected to be starving for their first victory, and one that would remind folks that they were a Final Four team last year who added Kemba Walker and center depth.
Sure, Bologna's victory here was largely due to beneficial shooting variance, on both sides of the ball. They shot 16-of-31 from 3 and Monaco shot 4-of-22. An impressive discrepancy, but it wasn't entirely luck either.
Monaco missed some good looks but also took some bad ones. It was a bad shooting night, but they didn't do themselves any favors with their shot selection either. A team with James and Elie Okobo is always going to have some undesirable hoists, but Bologna did a good job of forcing some of these while creating open looks for themselves at the other end.
The best part of this game for Bologna was that Iffe Lundberg looked like himself again. He finished with 14 points and 4 assists. It was an efficient ball game and the type of performance that makes you wonder why Bologna was trying to move on from him this summer.
Bologna is desperate for players who can break that first line of defense off the dribble, put pressure on the defense, and open the floor up for others. Lundberg brought that in Round 2 and they'll need him to keep doing so if they want a shot at the play-in this season.
EuroLeague losers: Monaco's missteps
It's only two games, and one of the losses was an abnormal shooting night as we already discussed. Walker and Jordan Lloyd are also waiting in the wings. Maybe we don't need to panic, but a 0-2 start is far from ideal for a team that is looking to build on their Final Four appearance from last season.
Also, are Walker and Lloyd going to fix this team's problems? They certainly won't on defense, and it is hard to see them fixing things on offense. While most coaches would kill for a backcourt with the talent that James and Okobo bring to the table you could argue it's causing them more harm than good so far. Both these guards like to isolate and take their opponents off the dribble. James has found success with this through two rounds, but Okobo has not.
The other issue with this offense is that it doesn't lend itself to credible backup plans when James is either resting or having an off night. It's not the type of offense that can be handed off to someone else, and it doesn't set others up for success either. Monaco is a one-dimensional ball club so far and the players they're waiting on to get healthy are more of what they already have. We expect their talent to start winning out, but like they were last season, they will always be prone to games and stretches like this one.
EuroLeague losers: Efes' porous defense
Opening the season with Barcelona away and Real Madrid at home is never going to be easy, and some may not even be surprised by Anadolu Efes' 0-2 start to the EuroLeague season. After all, they've got a new head coach and are replacing Vasilije Micic who left for the NBA. This transition was never going to be easy and is only tougher when you look at the two opponents they have faced.
We can buy part of that argument, while also still being incredibly concerned about their bottom-of-the-league defense that gave up 91 points to Barcelona in Round 1 and 103 to Real Madrid in Round 2. That's not new players and a new coach bad, that's either we don't care or we don't know what we're doing badly.
Barcelona shot 76 percent on two-point field goals against Efes. No typo, 76 percent is correct, 32-of-42 on 2-point field goals. Real Madrid shot 62 percent on 2-point field goals. So yes, through two games, Efes is allowing teams to shoot 69 percent on 2-point field goals. Not nice, not nice at all.
This defense is bad all around too. Shane Larkin has a massive target on his back and is getting run through more pick-and-rolls than a practice dummy. On the inside, Tibor Pleiss and Ante Zizic have failed to offer much resistance, and Tyrique Jones has been incredibly disappointing.
Jones was supposed to replace Bryant Dunston. The rugged veteran big man was the teams' dawg for both of their EuroLeague championships. He did the dirty work while letting Larkin and Micic fill up highlight reels. Heading into his late thirties Efes decided to let Dunston leave for Bologna and brought in Jones who played for new head coach Erdem Can at Turk Telekom Ankara last season. It seemed like the perfect roster move on paper, but has been far from it in reality. Jones and others will need to significantly improve their performance if Efes is going to turn things around and get themselves back in the playoffs.
EuroLeague Losers: ASVEL is an embarrassment for all of EuroLeague at the moment
We don't want to spend a lot of time on this, but through two rounds, ASVEL's average margin of defeat is 23.5 points per game. It's not just the size of the losses but also how bad they look. This team has zero fight, zero identity, zero plan, and almost seems accepting of the heavy losses.
This is not only a bad look for ASVEL, but also a bad look for EuroLeague. The league's slogan is that every game matters, but so far none of the games seem to matter to the Tony Parker-owned club. It's embarrassing, and the only possible positive outlook is that it can't get worse from here.
EuroLeague lines of the week:
Guerschon Yabusele finished with an efficient 22 points, 8 rebounds, and 4 assists in Real Madrid's dominant victory over Anadolu Efes. He shot 3-of-4 inside the arc, 3-of-3 from beyond it, and 7-of-7 from the line.
Tadas Sedekerskis finished with 11 points and 13 rebounds in Baskonia's first win of the season over Alba Berlin. His 13 boards accounted for a third of his team's rebounds.
EuroLeague quote of the week:
"I think he woke up and our arena woke up after his dunk." — Zalgiris coach Kazys Maksvytis said about Arnas Butkevicius' poster dunk on Joel Bolomboy.
EuroLeague clip of the week:
Matthias Lessort is a man motivated by consequences.
