BADALONA (Spain) - The second Semi-Final of the Basketball Champions League Season X, powered by Ameresco SUNEL sees a rematch of last year's Semi-Final between AEK BC and the defending back-to-back champions, Unicaja.
As far as BCL Semi-Final matchups go in the BCL, they don't come much more gargantuan than this. These two teams have made no less than eight Final Fours between them, with exactly four each.
Unicaja have now made it to their fourth consecutive Final Four and converted those four into two titles. AEK, on the other hand, have now reached their first consecutive Final Four, and of course won that iconic BCL title in 2018.
For Unicaja, the knockout phase of the BCL may well come as a welcome break from a challenging season in the Spanish Liga Endesa. With that 2-0 Quarter-Final series win over ALBA BERLIN, they have now won their last 10 games in the BCL Play-Offs.
For AEK, this is now the fourth of four Semi-Finals where they have faced a Spanish club. The first ended with an AEK win against Ibon Navarro's UCAM Murcia en route to the title in 2018 (sidenote: Dragan Sakota and Ibon Navarro are now 1-1 in BCL Semi-Finals).
The second was the 2020 demolition of Casademont Zaragoza in Athens. Last year, Unicaja had to play at their very best to beat them 71-65 in Athens.
Ibon Navarro's team have enjoyed complete dominance of the record between the two teams historically. Unicaja have now won three straight against AEK and held them to a maximum of 65 points in all three.
How they got here?
Unicaja cruised through the Regular Season in imperious form. They topped Group G with a 6-0 record and a +140 points differential. Their offense purred throughout, scoring 100 points or more in four of the six games. The last game of the Regular Season saw them claim a 115-84 win over Karditsa Iaponiki in regular time.
AEK were almost as dominant in the Regular Season, also topping Group F with a 5-1 record. The only blemish on the campaign was a loss to NHSZ-Szolnoki Olajbanyasz after they had already secured a spot in the Round of 16.
In the Round of 16, the perfect record flipped from Unicaja to AEK, with Unicaja having to battle through two losses against Spanish rivals Asisa Joventut and Fitness First Wurzburg Baskets.
The champions needed to pull off an 86-74 win over Joventut on the final Gameday of the R16 to win the head-to-head and claim homecourt advantage in the Quarter-Finals.
In the end, however, that homecourt advantage was inconsequential, as Unicaja cleaned up their Quarter-Final over ALBA BERLIN with a 2-0 record, winning a tight one in Berlin to reach the Final Four.
AEK went up through the gears in Group J of the R16 as they went 6-0 and finished with a +67 points differential. The closest they came to dropping a game was an impressive 93-90 win on the road at Tofas Bursa.
Thanks to Unicaja's final Gameday heroics in their R16 group, AEK were then paired with a high-pressure Quarter-Final series against Final Four hosts Asisa Joventut.
The series went with the home team in every game, with AEK eventually coming up clutch to win 72-67 at home to reach the Final Four.
What will this look like?
Rim runners and long-range gunners
Despite significant roster upheaval in the summer that saw Unicaja lose the likes of Tyson Carter, Dylan Osetkowski, and Kameron Taylor, the formula remains the same for Ibon Navarro's system.
We know that Kendrick Perry and Alberto Diaz will run the machine at all times, we know that everyone on the roster will share the minutes, and we know that on any given evening, any player on the Unicaja roster could be the one who does the damage.
As you see in the video below, the way they play is still built on the same foundations as well: the bigs run the floor relentlessly, and they create great looks consistently, just from finding those rim runners.
In the halfcourt, the tempo of execution in their actions doesn't change. The likes of Tyler Kalinoski and Jonathan Barreiro will charge around multiple screens off the ball, and paired with Unicaja's trademark ball movement, this team will always turn down good looks for great ones.
The difference this season could easily be from a number of their new players, not least the energy on the wings from James Webb III and Chase Audige, or the veteran smarts of Justin Cobbs, but really, the biggest difference maker has been Chris Duarte.
The Dominicans' shot-making and Caribbean rhythm are cut from a slightly different cloth than the Unicaja system that we know so well. But when he is in that flow state, he adds an unpredictable and, at times, unguardable element to this team.
The first clip in the video above perfectly illustrates what Duarte can add to this offense. We see Unicaja running the same Shuffle action from the last two seasons, with a weakside back screen for Olek Balcerowski to catch it in the post.
When the ball comes back out of the post, it finds its way to Duarte on the second side with 10 seconds on the shot clock. Duarte's ability to take matters into his own hands and create an open look on the step-back jumper could be a real challenge for this AEK defense.
In the rest of the video, we see Duarte moving away from the ball and putting up 7 points in a quarter against ALBA BERLIN. That ability to get hot and rack up points in a hurry has definitely added a different element to Unicaja this season.
When you put it all together, Unicaja are the most efficient team in the BCL this season. They have the best Offensive Rating at 121.5 and the best Defensive Rating, only conceding 102.3 points per 100 possessions.
Put together, their Net Rating has been 19.2 points per 100 possessions better than their opponents so far. They also make the most shots from deep at 10.4 per game.
Form meets function
AEK is a team that has been built for knockout basketball. The calling card and character of this team for most of the season has been defense, particularly with the on-ball hustle of Dimitris Flionis and a frontcourt unit including RaiQuan Gray, Greg Brown III, and Keyshawn Feazell, who are all able to switch and guard multiple positions.
Dragan Sakota also loves to throw in zones and switching defenses to disrupt structured offenses.
What you see in that video above is a man-to-man pressure defense that changed into a switching 2-3 zone mid-possession. The offense didn't catch on in time, and Bartley's steal turned into a runout on the other end.
We will likely see AEK's full range of defensive schemes against this ruthless Unicaja offense. They have only allowed 104 points per 100 possessions this season, which ranks them second in the Final Four and fourth overall. They may need to be even stingier to get the win against this Unicaja offense.
On the offensive end, they have combined that defensive character with having experienced, shot-makers all over the roster.
When you watch Dragan Sakota coaching this team, sometimes it feels like you can see him calculating the 1v1 matchups in his head, one lineup rotation at a time. And at other times, even two lineup rotations ahead of time.
Often, AEK don't even need to run a set; one of the more common actions you will see is what the basketball world often refers to as a Barkley Post Up, where a player with a favorable match up, will dribble themselves into a post-up from the perimeter.
AEK, and in particular RaiQuan Gray, love to create advantages and make plays like this. As soon as the defense sends any kind of help, they find their shot makers with bullet passes.
That second clip, btw, with Greg Brown III throwing down the hammer dunk? Yeah, you can already get yourself used to seeing that because AEK absolutely love throwing lobs up there for him and Feazell.
Brown, in particular, doesn't even really need the best pass to throw one down. AEK's guards know they just need to throw the ball anywhere near the rim, and he's getting up there to convert it into a highlight.
In terms of what's new for AEK, that answer is very easy: James Nunally.
Sakota used his experience as a squad builder and added the killer instinct and winning know-how of Nunally to his back court. The outcome has been instant clutch-time offense.
Nunally will hunt out switching defenses and destroy them in cold blood, without even the slightest hint of change in his facial expression.
Lineups and Go-To-Guys
Ibon Navarro will almost invariably start games with Perry as his starting point guard and Balcerowski as his starting center.
From there, we have usually seen Kalinoski as the starting shooting guard and one of Barreiro or Webb starting on the wing.
Killian Tillie and Emir Sulejmanovic have given him versatility and flexibility in the way he can rotate his front court, but with David Kravish returning from a long-term injury, and Tyson Perez also a possibility to play again, Unicaja's starting unit and lineup rotations have never been harder to predict.
Unicaja's most efficient lineup thus far this season has been Diaz, Dedovic, Duarte, Webb, and Balcerowski in a small-ball crew. We haven't seen this unit in large volumes (we don't see many Unicaja lineups in large volumes), but when they have been on the floor together, Unicaja have enjoyed a mind-bending Net Rating of +77 per 100 possessions.
Surprisingly, this has been mainly because of the defensive impact of going small and being flexible in more positions. It will be fascinating to see if and when Navarro throws this unit out against AEK's array of offensive playmakers.
AEK's starting lineup would appear to be, on paper at least, much more predictable. They started all three of their Quarter-Final series games against Joventut with Flionis and Frank Bartley in the back court, Vasilis Charalampopoulos on the wing, Gray playing everywhere, and Feazell in the paint.
Given that Unicaja is another Spanish opponent and presents very similar size challenges, there is no reason to expect any changes for this Semi-Final.
The lineup to watch out for will be when Sakota wants to score in explosive bursts. We have seen him use a lineup of Flionis, Bartley, Nunally, Gray, and Feazell, with almost all of his big guns out there at the same time. If we do see this, then look out because they have scored at a rate of 137 points per 100 possessions and enjoyed a ridiculous Net Rating of +87 per 100 possessions.
The go-to-guys in the clutch for this game are harder to predict due to the nature of AEK's roster and Unicaja's system. In just the Quarter-Final series alone, we saw Nunally, Bartley, and Dimitris Katsivelis all hit money-time shots for AEK, and for Unicaja, we know only too well that Kendrick Perry can flip from point guard and creator to clutch shot-maker and Final Four MVP when he needs to.
At this point of the season, the most consistent AEK killer in the clutch has been Bartley. He has scored 70 points in the last 5 minutes of games where the score difference is less than 10 points.
He made some big threes in those 70 points, but most of those points came inside the arc and by bullying his way to the free-throw line. Bartley shot 72 percent and 93 percent, respectively, from two-point range and at the line in clutch moments.
For Unicaja, as expected, the distribution of money time shots has been much more even, but the data and our own experience of this team tells us that cometh the hour, cometh the man, Kendrick Perry.
If Unicaja need a bucket late in a close game, Perry has already scored a team-high 30 points in the clutch this season.
X-Factors
Finally, we come to the guys who find a way to make game-winning impacts that their opponent may not have seen coming.
Last year, we saw the coming of age of Tyson Perez for Unicaja in Athens. Not many would have predicted him being the decisive factor in Unicaja going back-to-back, but there is no question that they wouldn't have lifted the trophy without him.
For Unicaja, that X-Factor this year could be Emir Sulejmanovic. The BIH power forward had his best game of the BCL season in the decisive Game 2, Quarter-Final win over ALBA BERLIN. He put up 15 points playing predominantly as a center, but also showed the ability to step out and stretch the floor.
Against this AEK front court, his mobility and versatility could be a factor that Ibon Navarro needs to lean into.
Although we must stress that of all the teams in this Badalona Final Four, Unicaja are, without question, the hardest to predict for player impact. Anyone out of Duarte, Barreiro, Dedovic, Webb, Audige, or Sulejmanovic could score 15 plus points, or score nothing at all.
As we have mentioned ad infinitum, AEK have shot-makers all over their roster, and for that reason, any of them, or none of them, could be an X-Factor in this Semi-Final.
Could we see Charalampopoulos or Lukas Lekavicius go off for six threes and break the game? Absolutely.
Could we see Katsivelis take over point guard duties and shoot over smaller guards? Undoubtedly.
But the player that we have gone for as the X-Factor is Greg Brown. We know that the AEK fans will travel in numbers. If he can throw down huge dunks and block shots to get them engaged early, they can almost make it like AEK are playing with six players on the floor.
We also know that Brown and Feazell have been absolutely vital to Sakota's ability to play switching defenses late in games. If Brown can switch onto a Unicaja guard late in the game when needed, the ability to get one stop can change the fate of entire seasons.
And finally...
There you have it, no doubt we have still missed something that will turn out to be the big story in this epic Semi-Final clash, but hopefully we have given you an insight into some of the big things to watch out for.
Unicaja vs. AEK BC tips off at 21:00 CET on Thursday, May 7. Be there or be square!