Your weekly round-up of games played in EuroLeague Women.

Group A

Eva Viteckova, soon after entering a new decade of being on this earth during the last week, showed she can still drop more than her age with a EuroLeague Women season highest scoring effort of 35 points. DeLisha Milton-Jones was out with a muscle injury but should be back for the playoffs.

Lotos Gdynia – ZVVZ USK Prague 66-102
Gdynia: Anderson 21, Henry 18, Knezevic 11
Prague: Viteckova 35, Eldebrink 19, Elhotova 17

A stat to take away from this UMMC rout – they were 2 from 15 behind the three point line. They’ve lost their 3p shooter who attempted more than a fourth of the team’s shots behind the arc. Will teams in the playoffs just return to the usual “zone the hell out of UMMC and make them win us from behind the arc” tactic?

UNI SEAT Gyor – UMMC Ekaterinburg 45-85
Gyor: Rasheed 11, Hollingsworth 8, Simon 7
UMMC: Parker 19 (11 reb), Gruda 16, Nolan 14, Leuchanka 12, Arteshina 9, Abrosimova 9

Galatasaray are three players deep when Prince has a good game. To be competitive in the Final Eight they would need at least two more Euros – a wing and a post, to replace Matic. Don’t see how they could nab players from Top 8 European teams so I’d start to work on the next season with trying to steal some Turkish players from Fenerbahce.

Ros Casares – Galatasaray 98-80
Ros: Moore 26, Murphy 20, Lyttle 13 (10 reb), Dominguez 11
Galatasaray: Taurasi 28, Charles 23, Prince 21

In a game where no one needed a win, VICI Aistes showed they needed it less than their opponents by playing a game of knockout during warm-ups.

Bourges Basket – VICI Aistes 78-49
Bourges: Joens 17, Kublina 11, Kaltsidou 11, Miyem 10, Ndongue 9, Brown 9
VICI: Pilypaitis 12, Sipaviciute 8, Pikciute 6

Group B

Polkowice, during the first quarter, dug themselves a too big of a hole to climb out of in the rest of the game. I might be living in the thoughts of EuroBasket Women 2011 but seeing Iva Perovanovic attempt just 6 shots in more than half an hour on the court doesn’t seem right.

CCC Polkowice – Nadezhda 58-71
CCC: Maltsi 13, Frazee 13, Perovanovic 10, Zoll 9
Nadezhda: Douglas 19, Zakalyuzhnaya 16, Verameyenka 10

Right now Fenerbahce has to be the best team in Europe. Maybe a couple of other teams might have bigger names on their rosters but this squad has the best chemistry on the court. Hopefully adding Cappie Pondexter to the training process won’t ruin that chemistry the EuroLeague Women squad has.

Fenerbahce – Perfumerias Avenida 84-64
Fenerbahce: Matovic 20, Taylor 15, McCoughtry 14, Tamane 10, Yilmaz 10
Avenida: Bonner 20, Antoja 8, Sanchez 8

Head coach removed, still can’t close out close games. Wild guess that the head coach of Tarbes wasn’t entirely responsible for that. Seems like the guy putting the team together should have been shown the door, too.

Beretta-Famila – Tarbes GB 68-66
Famila: Masciadri 22, Macchi 14, Erkic 12, Cohen 9
Tarbes: Montgomery 16, Cata-Chitiga 16, Lepron 8

Group C

A win-win-win game for Kosice. They were able to give their leaders some rest, Hana Horakova was able to run wild in her old stomping grounds while shaking of some rust and they won the game.

Frisco Brno – Good Angels Kosice 57-79
Brno: Peckova 13, Thomas 11, Hanusova 8, Staalvant 8, Kasparkova 8
Kosice: Horakova 17, Sverrisdottir 12, Jurcenkova 10, Kupcikova 9

This Wisla Can-Pack is nowhere the same Wisla Can-Pack than the Wisla Can-Pack with Erin Phillips on the squad. I believe I’ve set the new world record for times Wisla Can-Pack has been mentioned in a sentence.

Wisla Can-Pack – Gospic CO 74-71
Wisla: Kobryn 23 (11 reb), Powell 19, Bjelica 14 (10 reb), De Mondt 12
Gospic: Mandir 16, Vrsaljko 13, Ivezic 12

Sparta&K essentially had the choice of who they want to play in the playoffs. By making a last second shot they landed Nadezhda Orenburg with whom they’ve had some very close battles this season, if they would have just held on to the ball and not made the shot they would have gotten Good Angels Kosice who they’ve defeated twice this season. Let’s see how this choice will play out.

BLMA – Sparta&K 71-72
BLMA: Lawson-Wade 19, Lelas 14, Chones 14
Sparta&K: Augustus 22, Petrovic 14, Hammon 13, Kuzina 10, Osipova 9 (11 reb)

Megan Mahoney and Elodie Godin combined for Taranto’s last 12 points as they came back to win a meaningless game against Rivas Ecopolis. After this game Taranto are probably kicking themselves for the abysmal start of the season with that 17 point loss to BLMA which later proved to be the deciding score.

CB Taranto – Rivas Ecopolis 68-65
Taranto: Ballardini 13, Godin 12, Mahoney 10, Vaughn 10
Rivas: Jones 17, Carson 15, Aguilar 8, Pirsic 8

What if…

Now let’s take a look at how the playoff seedings would have turned out in case all games counted towards seeding and if all games between top 7 teams would have counted which apparently was also among options.

Among the teams positively effected by the new system appears to be Wisla Can-Pack, Rivas Ecopolis and Beretta Famila. Negatively – Sparta&K, UMMC, Nadezhda, Prague. Cue the conspiracy theories from Russian team fans about a rule change that took place before a single game was played.