Panathinaikos one win away from winning group C

Sarunas Jasikevicius against his former team (EFE)

11-01-2008 01:58

Panathinaikos took a major step to become the Group C champion by edging AXA FC Barcelona 55-56 in Spain on Thursday. Panathinaikos leads Group C with the best record in the entire competition, 10-1. Meanwhile, Barcelona ties with archrivals Real Madrid for the second place at 8-3. Madrid hosts Barcelona next week in a highly-anticipated showdown.

Kostas Tsartsaris paced the winners with 20 points on 5-for-9 three-pointers and 8 rebounds, but Vassilis Spanoulis became the game hero with the go-ahead three-pointer with 31.8 seconds remaining.

Roger Grimau had 17 points on 6-for-7 two-pointers and 7 rebounds for Barcelona, that used a 14-0 run to get its only double-digit margin, 29-18, late in the second quarter.

Dimitris Diamantidis brought Panathinaikos within 31-23 at halftime, while Demos Dikoudis and Nikos Hatzivrettas stroke from downtown in a 0-9 run that gave the Greens a 40-44 edge.

It all came down to the final seconds, a Spanoulis gave Panathinaikos a 54-55 edge.
Diamantidis made 1-for-2 free throws, but so did Grimau in the other end. Barcelona had a chance to win the game, but Jaka Lakovic and Gianluca Basile missed respective off-balanced shots in the final seconds.