Four victories in as many matches, two of them in official events, counts the National basketball team opposite to New Zealand just before Wednesday’s “final” to qualify for his “16”. World Cup. In fact, the two teams had also met in the 2019 World Cup, in a… deja vu, since even then the match was “final” for qualifying for the round of 16.
Christos Robolis writes from Manila
On July 18, 2008, Greece hosted the Pre-Olympic Tournament in Athens claiming qualification for Beijing. And he succeeded, beating New Zealand along the way. The Tall Blacks introduced the ‘Haka’ at the OAKA winning (after some initial boos from the uninitiated) applause, but in practice they proved to be a low hurdle.
National won easily with 75-48 having his first scorers Vasilis Spanoulis with 14 and Dimitris Diamantidis with 11 points. In fact, the current coach of the team, Pero Cameron, belonged to the New Zealand roster at the time.
By crushing Puerto Rico as well (88-63), it booked a place for the Beijing Olympic Games, where it made its most recent appearance in the event.
Greece and New Zealand met two other times, in friendly matches, with the National team winning easily. In 2012, in a friendly match in São Carlos, Brazil (a few days before the Pre-Olympic Games in Venezuela), Elias Zouro’s team had won 99-69 with 18 points by Giorgos Printezis and 13 by Yiannis Bourousis, while the current captain had 12 Kostas Papanikolaou and Antonis Fotsis.
Two years later, in a test in Kaunas before the World Cup in Spain, the national team threw a new 300 against the New Zealanders, 95-65. Yiannis Bourousis had 15 points, the current general manager of Andron Nikos Zisis and Kostas Papanikolaou each had 14 points, while Giorgos Printezis had 10. In fact, he had also played in that match John Antetokounmpo (having 3 points), in his first summer with Andron.
The 2019 in China World Cup, Greece played a similar “final” to that of Wednesday against New Zealand. With both teams having beaten Montenegro but lost to Brazil, they were playing for qualification to the third matchday of the group. The Tall Blacks had put enough pressure on the National team until it reached the 103-97 winby Giannis Antetokounmpo to count 24 points, 10 rebounds, 6 steals and 2 blocks, while 16 points had Ioannis Papapetrou and Nick Calathes another 14, with 5 rebounds, 4 assists and 3 steals.
The prehistory in detail:
18/07/2008 (Pre-Olympic / Marousi): Greece-New Zealand 75-48
28/06/2012 (Friendly / Sao Carlos): Greece-New Zealand 99-69
18/08/2014 (Friendly / Kaunas): Greece-New Zealand 95-65
05/09/2019 (World Cup / Nanjing) 103-97
Source: Sport Fm
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