Greece made of steel took the bronze at Eurobasket U20!

The match

Greece starts with Zougri, Samonturov, Vassiliou, Karakosta and Paraskevopoulos. After a mediocre start, as they found themselves behind 6-0, the National Team balanced the situation and took the lead (8-9) in the 4th minute. Then, Paraskevopoulos and Zougris sent Papadopoulos’ team to +6 (11-17), which it maintained until the end of the first period (15-21).

In the first four minutes of the second period, the poor perimeter defense of the National team gave many free three-pointers to Belgium and thus not only did the upset, but escaped to +5 (30-25). Greece did not solve its offensive problem even afterwards, with the Belgians increasing the difference to +11 (40-29) and Konstantinidis’ shots making it 40-31 in the first half.

With Samonturov and Konstantinidis, Greece got closer (42-38), in the first four minutes of the second half. Belgium reacted and escaped to +8 (48-40), with the National team responding with a forward from Zougris and reducing again at the end of the third period (50-46).

At the beginning of the fourth quarter, the Belgians maintained their distance with three-pointers (56-50), with Greece reacting with Konstantinidis as the protagonist and taking the lead (56-57) with a 7-0 run at 34′ . Afterwards, the two teams kept pace with the score, with Karakosta’s three-pointer bringing the National Team to +2 (63-65), 1:20 before the end. Belgium temporarily equalized, with Konstantinidis responding with a personal 4-0, for +4 (65-69), with 10.1” to go, taking the final victory 68-70!

The quarters: 15-21, 40-31, 50-46, 68-70

See the match statistics here