Olimpia Brasov - SCM Craiova, 22 October, 2014

BASKETBALL

ROMANIA - LIGA NATIONALA (WOMEN)

OLIMPIA BRASOV v SCM CRAIOVA 

Olimpia CSU Brasov is my hometown’s women basketball team. I’m always going to see the girl’s home matches, I never missed one in the past three years. I saw the first 4 home games of the season and I think we have a much better roster than in previous seasons. The best player of the team is the 27-year old point guard Britney Cimone Jones, who arrived this summer from Targoviste, a very spectacular player, maybe the best foreign player ever played here. Sonia Ursu is a very talented young girl with great shooting skills, a real team-player, who is doing a very nice job in defence too. Gabriel Irimia is a decent player, who is making a great work in defence and usually helps the team with 3-point shots and drawing fouls.  Carla Donette Bartee is a very important piece in this team, she is an experienced, massive power forward, who grabs a lot of rebounds and usually scores spectacular baskets from midrange or 3-pointers. Shuanda Ashford, who arrived this summer from Oradea, is a massive Center, who is playing well under the basket. The sixth man of the team is newcomer Center, Zorica Mitov, an interesting player, who I am sure will help a lot this season. Andra Simona Haas (SG) and Madalina Cioroiu (PG) are ambitious, but average rotation players. Gabriela Magurean did not play in this season, she is injured. The 17-year old guard Ana Ferariu is one of the best players in Romania in the 16-19 age range, very talented and skill gifted young girl, who is more and more confident by every minute she plays in National League. Ecaterina Armanu, Teodora Armanu, Iulia Brezoi are very young girls, who along Ana are performing very well in the past seasons at the Junior Team led by the assistant coach, Nenad Marinkovic. The coach of the team is Dan Calancea, a good tactician, an experienced and well known coach in Romania. In conclusion, we have a young roster with good foreign players in comparison with other teams and I am sure we can finish on 5th or 6th place and make good games in play-off. We started the season with two games in the Romanian Cup against a tough opponent, Alexandria, home win and lost away :

Olimpia Brasov – CSBT Alexandria : 71 – 69

CSBT Alexandria – Olimpia Brasov : 66 – 55

In the championship we demolished a poor team at home, lost decently on road against a very good team, a title-contender, 2 normal wins against mid-table teams and surprisingly lost in the last round against a spectacular team : 

Olimpia Brasov – CSM Universitea Oradea : 85 – 47

CSU Alba-Iulia – Olimpia Brasov : 75 – 65

Olimpia Brasov – CSM Satu Mare : 87 – 72

Olimpia Brasov - Rapid Bucuresti : 74 - 51 

Nova Vita Targu-Mures - Olimpia Brasov : 84 - 74  

SCM Craiova is clearly the weakest team of the league. Nothing has changed there, because they had a very poor season last year too. They have only one dangerous player, Irina Motateanu(Bors), who is scoring a lot of points, narrowly the half of the team's total points. She has only 2 decent teammates : swingman Adina Pop and forward Janina Simionca, the roster is completed with very young players without experience... They lost all of their games and I think probably they will finish this season with 0 Wins... 

In the championship they played 5 games(5L) : 

CSM Satu Mare – SCM Craiova : 101 – 68

SCM Craiova – Rapid Bucuresti : 55 – 66

Nova Vita – SCM Craiova : 91 – 50

SCM Craiova – Sepsi Szentgyorgy : 34 – 125 

SCM Craiova – Phoenix Galati : 46 – 97

Last season : Olimpia Brasov – SCM Craiova : 100 – 43

I wrote for the last home game of Olimpia Brasov to cover a huge handicap(-18.5)... they did it, but the girls don't play as I expected... They played bad in the first and the third quarter, practically speaking, they managed to cover that handicap in the fourth quarter.. One week later they played on road at Targu-Mures against Nova Vita and I think the girls were a bit relaxed, because normally on that match Brasov was the favourite and that lost game can be important at the end of the regular season in the equation of playoff spot battle... I think is clear for everybody that Olimpia Brasov will win today, but I try to find value on handicap(-48.5), total points line (143.5). For our girls will come a tough period, because on Saturday we will travel to Galati to play against a serious playoff contender, Phoenix, and after that we will host one of the best team in Romania, Sepsi Szentgyorgy... so I think the girls won't be 100% concentrated on today's game and very probably our best players will play less minutes than usually to rest & protect themselves and our young, junior girls will play at least around 10-15 minutes... Normally, if Brasov plays at full strength, they can cover that huge handicap and make a spectacular game, but I anticipate that our rotation will be different as usually and our girls are thinking on the game against Phoenix and if Motateanu and Pop will have a good day, maybe they can reduce the big margin.... 

• SCM Craiova + 48.5 points - 1.80  (Superbet)  | ✖