Brose Baskets surprised Olympiacos 73-61

The Turkish Airlines Euroleague season had one of its biggest upsets yet as Brose Baskets downed visiting Olympiacos Piraeus by 73-61 on Wednesday in Bamberg, Germany. Both teams now have 1-1 records in Group B. Brose withstood a 0-10 takeover run by Olympiacos right after halftime to come back and win going away thanks to its own 16-4 run bridging the final two quarters. Point guard Brian Roberts inspired the winners with 23 points, including 3 of 5 three-point shooting, to go with 5 rebounds and 2 steals. Kyle Hines followed with 14 points, while Gavel Anton had 11 and Casey Jacobsen 10. Brose won despite Olympiacos hitting 11 more free throws because the Reds could not shoot accurately from long-range in the face of the strong defense from the hosts. The Reds kept launching, but made 6 of 28 three-point attempts. Theo Papaloukas had 13 points for Olympiacos, Milos Teodosic and Vassilis Spanoulis 11 each.

Spanoulis and Gavel opepend the game with dueling triples before Nesterovic dropped a hook shot and Nielsen a pair of free throws to give Olympiacos a quick 3-7 advantage. Gavel and Nesterovic exchanged baskets before a timeout. Out of that, Gavel scored on a fastbreak, giving him all 7 of his team's points. Spanoulis ended a broken play with a face-up triple for a 7-12 scoreboard. Jacobsen responded with a driving one-hand layup, although Nielsen made a pick-and-roll basket at 9-14. Jacobsen kept lifting his side with a triple and Roberts nailed a long two-pointer as the Brose defense kept causing Olympiacos problems. Reyshawn Terry crowned that effort with an impressive reverse layup to let Brose tie it up, 16-16, after one quarter.

Teodosic found Nielsen on one end, while Roberts and Kyle Hines connected on the other to maintain the tie at the start of the second quarter. Yet another steal by Brose sent Roberts the other way for an acrobatic fastbreak layup good for 20-19 lead for the home team. Olympiacos got free throws from Ioannis Bourousis and a triple from Zoran Erceg to go up 20-24, but Brose answered with a 10-0 blast punctuated by triples from Jacobsen and Roberts that set the tone for the rest of the game. Papaloukas entered at last and broke the Olympiacos slide with a layup to which Nielsen soon added a pair of free throws at 30-28. But Brose was confident now. After Hines tipped in Brose's next miss, Roberts landed a rainbow on the halftime buzzer to give the hosts their biggest lead, 34-28.

Olympiacos started the second half with Papaloukas, Spanoulis and Teodosic as triple point guards. The effect was immediate Papaloukas and Teodosic had a three-point play each. When Papaloukas followed with 2 more layups, the Reds had a 0-10 run and and the scoreboard had flipped to 34-38. Brose did not lose its cool, however. John Goldsberry came off the bench for a big triple, while Anton and Hines kept the hosts close at 41-44. Roberts reappeared with a jumper as the Olympiacos offense stalled, then Terry hit twice from the line. When Anton got loose for an open jumper in the lane, Brose had another lead, 47-45. Papaloukas tied it again at the foul line, but Roberts ran out the third-quarter clock and launched a killer triple on the buzzer to keep the hosts in charge, 50-47.

After Hines opened the last quarter with a layup, Teodosic tried to rally the Reds with a big three-pointer. But Roberts was having none of it, and shot from even further away to make it 55-50. Then, when Hines blasted in for a huge dunk, the Bamberg crowd was on its feet. After a timeout, Olympiacos went to Teodosic for another triple, but Terry danced through the Reds' defense to make it 59-53. The next Brose basket was by Jacobsen, and Spanoulis tried to respond with a three-pointer. Tibor Pleiss made 2 of 4 free throws for the hosts, and Papaloukas made a layup, but time was running out on the Reds. With the way Brose kept playing defense, 2 missed free throws by Papaloukas hurt the visitors. Especially when Hines answered at the other end with a driving dunk through the heart of the Olympiacos defense. His putback of a miss entering the final minute made it 67-61, settling the matter of a huge upset in Group B.