February 04, 2012
Week 1 MVP: Rado Rancik, Galatasaray Cafe Crown
Rado Rancik - Galatasaray Cafe Crown (Photo: galatasaray.org)On an opening night full of major performances, it took a truly stellar one to earn Eurocup regular season Week 1 honors. Radoslav Rancik was stellar and more while leading Galatasaray Cafe Crown to a 96-82 home win against BC Azovmash. Rancik, playing for his third different Eurocup team in as many seasons, had a career night to celebrate Galatasaray's opening game. He tied the competition's 40-minute scoring mark with 39 points on 14-for-21 two-point and 5-for-5 free-throw shooting. In fact, only two players ever scored more points in a Eurocup game: Randy Duck (49) and Bobby Brown (44), both in multiple-overtime thrillers. Rancik added 7 rebounds, 2 assists, 3 steals, a block and 6 fouls drawn to amass a performance index rating of 41. Following in second place on Tuesday was another long-time Eurocup star with a new team, Michael Wright of PGE Turow, who collected a 36 index rating in his team's narrow home loss to Sluc Nancy. Wright shined with 26 points on 8-of-13 two-pointers and 10-of-10 free throws, 4 rebounds and 10 fouls drawn. Marko Popovic of Unics was the big gun in his team's record-breaking home win against Besiktas Cola Turka. While Unics broke the competition's three-point team record by making 20 shots from the arc, Popovic led the way with 36 points on 9-of-14 shooting from downtown, which tied the Eurocup record set by Ruben Douglas of Valencia with 9-for-12 accuracy on December 4, 2007. Popovic added 5 assists and 4 fouls drawn for a 33 index. Dijon Thompson of Hapoel Jerusalem (index 30) and Mire Chatman (29) of Besiktas completed the best individual performances this week.

Individual highs: Chatman, 9 assists

Rancik obviously was the best scorer in the Eurocup's opening night with 39 points, tying Mike Penberthy as the only players to reach that total in a non-overtime Eurocup game. Penberthy scored 39 on November 23, 2004 as Pompea Napoli edged Telekom Baskets Bonn 86-84. Four players - Thompson, Aaron Pettway of BK Ventspils, Brandon Brown of Siauliai and Kresimir Loncar of Unics - pulled down 11 rebounds each in Game 1. Chatman led Game 1 in assists by dishing 9 in Besiktas's road loss against Unics. Zakhar Pashutin collected 4 steals to help Spartak St. Petersburg to register a 85-83 home win against Turk Telekom. Pettway. Kosta Perovic of Power Electronics Valencia and Randal Falker of Cholet Basket each had 4 blocks in this round. Thompson, Pettway, Brown, Loncar and Erwin Dudley of Turk Telekom registered respective double-doubles in Week 1.
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Eurocupbasketball.com
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