– David Hein
Six days into the easyCredit BBL Final Tournament 2020 and the season-ending event has been full of great storylines. With the starved sports world looking upon the Audi Dome in Munich, ratiopharm ulm have surprised many with a perfect 3-0 record. The tournament also has seen a number of young German players shine and the team hotel has developed the feeling of a y-outh hostel. Oh, and the detailed hygiene concept is working as there have been no positive tests for Covid-19.
In this section, we break out our English language skills and inform you about the latest news from the German easyCredit Basketball Bundesliga. If you’re short on time but still want your fill of Ger-many’s top basketball league then you are in the right place. Every week David Hein (www.heinnews.com) brings you up-to-date in German basketball – the easyCredit BBL short and sweet:
All negative tests
The biggest concern going into the easyCredit BBL Final Tournament 2020 was that a member of one of the 10 teams or someone else within the event bubble would contract the Covid-19 virus. But all tests and re-tests taken thus far have come up negative. Six of the 10 teams will be tested again on Friday, June 12.
The world is watching
With the countries across the globe only starting to come out of the Covid-19 lockdown, the sports world have been starved for three months for live sports and the easyCredit BBL has the world’s eyes locked upon it. Many have been asking the German league about how they were able to plan and organize the event, as well as the detailed hygiene concept. ALBA BERLIN head coach Aito Garcias Reneses has been contacted by numerous media outlets in Spain wanting to know about the tournament since the Spanish ACB will be hosting a similar season-ending event from June 17-30 in Valencia. And the NBA is also looking to Germany about how things are going on here.
Ulm can do no wrong
One of the many surprises thus far from the first six days of games has been ratiopharm ulm, who have already locked up a spot in the Quarterfinals playoffs with three straight victories. Jaka Lakovic’s team was not expected to be doing what they are doing, especially because they are without their main leader from the regular season, Killian Hayes, who is still in the United States. But Ulm brought in Thomas Klepeisz from Basketball Löwen Braunschweig and signed Dylan Osetkowski from BG Göttingen and let Tyler Harvey run the show - and the results have been outstanding. First off, Ulm beat FC Bayern Munich 95-85, shooting 51.5 percent from the field and followed that with an 85-66 win over EWE Baskets Oldenburg. They avoided a slip-up over deci-mated HAKRO Merlins Crailsheim with a 92-80 triumph. The team seems al-most liberated without Hayes that they can all share the ball and the playma-king duties and that has led them to be the story of the tournament so far. Still Lakovic, Per Günther and co. hope they can make real headlines in the playoffs.
Young gunners take advantage of chance
Another big story has been the impressive showing of many young German players in the tournament. The first game of the event saw 21-year-old Ben-net Hundt pour in a career-high 30 points in BG Göttingen’s surprise win over HARKO Merlins Crailsheim. There has also been fellow 21-year-old Richard Freudenberg and 17-year-old Len Schoormann from FRAPORT SKYLI-NERS, 20-year-old Jonas Mattisseck from ALBA BERLIN, 18-year-olds Luc van Slooten from RASTA Vechta and Ariel Hukporti from MHP RIESEN Lud-wigsburg, who also have seen 18-year-old Lukas Herzog score the first points of his easyCredit BBL history and 16-year-old Jacob Patrick make his-tory (more later on him). There are a couple of reasons the German talents have been able to shine. For one, many of them were able to stay really fit during the Covid-19 break, working out regularly - Hundt twice a day usually - and that gave them an advantage over some of their American teammates when they came back for the re-start of the league. The German prospects’ age also played a role since some of the older players needed more time to get their bodies back up to speed after much less action over three months.
Gotta have depth
There have been no short rotations in this tournament, which probably isn’t a surprise given that teams are playing just about every two days. Through the first six days of action - 12 games - the teams have used all of the players on their roster 13 times, including RASTA Vechta playing all 10 of their players in both of their games. And five more times the teams played 11 players, mean-ing 75 percent of the teams have rested maximum one player.
Give me your wild baller
The easyCredit BBL Final Tournament 2020 has been dominated by kind of cool, wild ballers. Marcos Knight took MHP RIESEN Ludwigsburg on his back against FRAPORT SKYLINERS and won the game with step-back threes while Jordan Crawford has been doing the things that made him an NBA player - even though Brose Bamberg are winless through two games. Look at ALBA BERLIN and how Peyton Siva was needed to save them in their first game as they came out of the gates slowly. Tyler Harvey knows he has much more freedom for ratiopharm ulm and that is showing with some of his long bombs.
A couple of fans
The event of course is being played without fans in the Audi Dome, but there are actually a couple of fans allowed into the games. Well, not quite fans. The teams are allowed to have four people in the stands as passive observers. Most of the time those individuals are team officials such as general mana-gers or sports directors or youth coaches. But it sure is strange to not see fans in the stands and hear the drums being banged during the games.
And he’s back
It was a long time coming but Stefan Peno is back. He made his season de-but in ALBA BERLIN’s first game of the Final Tournament 2020, starting against FRAPORT SKYLINERS and scoring Berlin’s first points. The Serbian point guard suffered a number of setbacks but played for the first time in 16 months - since February 2, 2019. It’s great to have you back Stefan, stay healthy!
A for effort and heart
HAKRO Merlins Crailsheim may be winless through three games but they have continued their impressive season as the surprise of 2019-20 have been one of the darlings of the tournament in Munich. That is because of the heart and passion with which they are playing. Crailsheim already did not have three important import players from the season return after the Covid-19 break and then three more got injured during the preparation or tournament and head coach Tuomas Iisalo had no Americans for the game against rati-opharm ulm but the team still gave a huge fight.
Youth hostel feeling at team hotel
There is almost a youth hostel feeling going on in the team hotel as players from the 10 teams are interacting amongst one another as if they are back-packers from across Europe. As part of the hygiene concept, the teams are quarantined in one hotel and not allowed to go anywhere else - though they are permitted to leave the hotel in groups up to three people but not allowed to shop or see any outsiders. All this is to create a bubble of active partici-pants - also including the referees - so as to avoid contact with the “outside world” and thereby allow the players, coaches and staff to move around the hotel without face masks and adhere to social distancing norms. The teams have a play room in the hotel, which includes a golf machine, dart boards and table tennis and many players have been taking advantage of that - also with players from other teams. And the teams have even come together to watch the games of the other teams going on in the Audi Dome, with five teams ta-king in on the big screen in the hotel the showdown between ALBA BERLIN and Brose Bamberg.
Jacob Patrick becomes league’s youngest scorer since 1998
History was made in the historic tournament when Jacob Patrick drained a three-pointer for MHP RIESEN Ludwigsburg against FRAPORT SKYLINERS as he became the youngest player to score in an easyCredit BBL since the start of data collection in 1998. Patrick, the younger son of Ludwigsburg head coach John Patrick, was just 16 years, 6 months and 19 days old when he scored, ending the game with 8 points.
Hukporti: 2021 NBA Draft, but first home for school exams
Another MHP RIESEN Ludwigsburg youngster made headlines in Munich when 18-year-old big man Ariel Hukporti announced that he plans to register for the 2021 NBA Draft. Hukporti has shown in the easyCredit BBL Final Tournament 2020 what he can do with 10 points against Brose Bamberg. But his tournament is over as he must return home to take important school exams. He will most likely not return for the end of the tournament given the schedule and the ensuing quarantine he must complete to come back.
Hamburg part ways with head coach Mike Taylor
There are seven other easyCredit BBL teams not playing in Munich and there is some news from them as well. Hamburg Towers will have a new coach on the sidelines next season as they refused to re-sign head coach Mike Taylor, whose deal will expire at the end of July. Taylor joined Hamburg in 2018 and immediately led the Towers from ProA to the Bundesliga. Hamburg were not relegated this season despite winning only three games as the league de-cided there would be no relegated teams after the Covid-19 outbreak ended the regular season.
MBC add Polish league top scorer Michalak
TSYNTAINICS MBC meanwhile have made an addition to their roster for next season as they signed Polish international Michal Michalak. The 25-year-old wing led the Polish league in scoring last season, pouring in 21.9 points a game for Legia Warsaw. He signed a one-year deal with MBC.
LIVE-VIDEO: Was habt ihr im Alter von 16 Jahren, 6 Monaten, 17 Tagen gemacht? @MHP_RIE-SEN-Guard Jacob Patrick hat in dem Alter seine ersten #easyCreditBBL-Punkte er-zielt - als jüngster Spieler unserer digitalen Liga-Historie! #FI-NAL2020 pic.twit-ter.com/hL6bTG07Cj
— easyCredit BBL (@easyCreditBBL) June 9, 2020
