Were the main favorite for the Gold. Last summer they won the Silver in the U17 World Championship of Hamburg (Germany). And a few weeks ago they competed in an interesting level in the U19 World Championship of Riga (Latvia). Big names, big prospects. Mateusz Ponitka ('93) and Przemek Karnowski ('93) are the most intriguing ones, but Michal Michalak ('93), Piotr Niedzwiedzki ('93) and Tomas Gielo ('93) -will play for Liberty (NCAA)- are really talented players also. But what happened? For some reasons they weren't playing as their usual level and yesterday they were knocked out in the quartefinals of the U18 Division "A" European Championship held in their home country after being killed by Italy. Amedeo Della Valle ('93), second best event's scorer (17.7), didn't play due to an injury. And at half time they were already 15 down because he made an horrible second quarter (9-23). Who will fight now for the big trophy? Today semifinals will be Italy-Serbia (18.00h) and Spain-Turkey (21.15h). Let's see yesterday results.
In the first quarterfinals match-up Spain and Croatia played a tied contest during the first minutes, but spaniards law inside the paint became one of the reasons of the win (64-50). Jaime Fernández ('93), from Asefa Estudiantes (ACB), led the victory with 16 points and 6 assists, while Daniel Diez ('93) added 9 points and 15 rebounds and Álex Suárez ('93) flirted with the double-double (9+9). At the losing effort Bosnian born Marko Ramljak ('93) finished as the best scorer with 14, pulling down 6 rebounds, while youngster Mislav Brzoja ('94) had 12 and 3 boards. In the second game Turkey made it to semifinals after beating Lithuania (80-70). 6'8'' PF Samet Geyik ('93) scored 20 points and grabbed 8 rebounds, while Ahmet Tuncer ('93) and Tayfun Erülkü ('94) nailed 12 apiece. Lithuanians made a 13-30 run in the third quarter to come back after a 12 points deficit at half time, but Turkey killed them in the last ten minutes: 24-9. SG Tomas Lekunas ('93) tallied 15 points with 6/11 FG and Tauras Jogela ('93) -MVP U16 EC'09- added 11 and 4 steals.
Poland were knocked out of the title fight after a 52-70 defeat against Italy. 7'0'' Karnowski collected a double-double (14+10) and Ponitka added added 11 with 7 boards. But wasn't enough. Even Della Valle was sidelined due to an injury Matteo Imbrò ('94) appeared with a great job: 17 points and 4/10 from downtown. Diego Monaldi ('93) knocked 16 with 6/10 FG and Matteo Chillo ('93) 14 points (5/9 FG). 18 points scored between second and third quarters for Poland. No comment. Finally Serbia took the last ticket for the Top-4 winning France (61-71). French kids struggled when 6'8'' Mouhammadou Jaiteh ('94) was fouled out after 15 points and 8 boards. Benjamin John ('93) and William Howard ('93) had 11 points each. At Serbian side Nemanja Bezbradica ('93) led the win with 19 points and 7/12 FG, while Nenad Miljenovic ('93) was also key with 15 and 4 assists.
In the classification between 9th and 12th Latvia beat Slovenia (69-78) led by 6'8'' Andrejs Grazulis ('93): 13 points with 6/7 FG. 6'10'' Ziga Dimec ('93) wasn't enough with 22 points and 7 rebounds. In the other contest of this fight Russia defeated Germany (69-66) behind Gleb Goldyrev ('93): 15 points with 3/6 threes. German Paul Zipser ('94) had 21 with 4/5 from downtown.
Finally, in the relegation battle, Czech Republic beat Finland (67-61) with a great job from Martin Kriz ('93), who collected a huge double-double (25+14), while 6'11'' Joonas Caven ('93) ended with 19 and 12 boards. In the other game Ukraine beat Greece (68-60) behind 5'9'' PG Klym Artamonov ('93): 21 points and 6 assists. Volodymyr Gerun ('94) nailed 16 with 18 boards. For Greece Petros Melissaratos ('93) ended with 18 points and 10 rebounds. The worst two will go down.
Standings (relegation round): Ukraine (3-1), Greece and Czech Republic (2-2) and Finland (1-3).
Photo: FIBA Europe / Wojtek Figurski
