3stepsbasket

14/05/2026

THE REVERSE SWEEP: How Pedro Martínez and Valencia Exposed Panathinaikos 🍊🏀

Going 0-2 down at home in a Playoff series usually means it's over. But for Valencia Basket and the EuroLeague Coach of the Year, Pedro Martínez, it was just the setup for a tactical masterclass.

While Panathinaikos played the names, Valencia played the numbers. Here is how the "Silent" reverse sweep happened:

1. The Warning Signs Ataman Ignored
In their 2 regular season head-to-head match-ups, Valencia already had a very strong 125.7 ORTG.
The biggest red flag was rebounding for Pana. They only managed a 43.1% REB% in those games, allowing extra possessions and extra points to Valencia.

2. The "Sloukas Paradox"
Pana fans complained about the refs, but the data tells a different story. In the regular season, Pana’s Free Throw Attempt rate was a huge 43.7% with Sloukas on the floor.
Without him it was just 19.6%. That was the second chapter of homework that Ataman ignored before the playoffs.

3. The Glass Dominance
In the 2 RS games, Faried (35.5% team REB%), Lessort (39.5%) and Hernangomez (40.7%) were the three worst players for Pana REB% when on the floor.
Pana didn't adjust their rebounding habits, on the other hand Martinez capitalized.
In the POs games, Valencia's 2nd unit went on a mission to clean the glass. When De Larrea was on, Valencia grabbed 80.8% of all defensive rebounds. Same for Pradila (74.5%) and Moore (73.9%).

4. The Costello + Badio Trap
When Costello and Badio shared the floor, Pana's ball protection wasn't just there.
📉 Valencia TOV%: 12.9% (Elite)
📈 Pana TOV%: 21.7%

When you add De Larrea to that mix? Pana’s turnover rate spiked to a disastrous 42.9%.

5. The Youth vs. The Star: De Larrea vs. Nunn
In one of the most interesting match-ups of the series, Sergio De Larrea neutralized Kendrick Nunn. In 41 minutes when they shared the floor:
🏀 Score: 96-61 Valencia
🏀 Pana ORTG: A poor 82.5
🏀 Valencia AST%: An unbelievable 90.6%

6. The Impact: Montero vs. Shorts
Montero outscored the matchup 117-96 in their 52 minutes together on the court.
Note that TJ was one of the Pana players with the lowest NETRTG in the 2 regular season games against Valencia too, another known issue.

The Verdict
Basketball is a game of adjustments. While Ergin Ataman stuck to his stars, Pedro Martínez utilized every analytical edge to get what he wanted.

01/05/2026

The 3StepsBasket website, ten years ago.
That version used to host -approximately- zero users per day 🪹

And now?
The next version of the PRO website is heavily inspired by it's 0-users ancestor 😀
Stay tuned...

4 likes. "3 Steps Basket - Introduction"

08/02/2026

🔥

24/01/2026

It’s getting hot in 🔥
Here’s a look at Strength of Schedule compared to each team’s current winning level.

😬
A really tough road ahead.
Their average opponent is almost as strong as they are — there’s basically no room for mistakes.

😠
Also facing a tough schedule, but with an important difference:
they’re clearly better than the teams they’ll face.
(Similar story for Hapoel.)

🙄 Maccabi, Milan, Dubai & Virtus
All with relatively easy schedules on paper…
but they’re fighting each other for the same playoff spots.
Easy schedule, brutal reality.

😉 Žalgiris, Olympiacos, Real & Fenerbahçe
Good chances to improve their position as the season goes on.

😃 Monaco
One of the easiest remaining schedules.
A big opportunity to create separation.

17/01/2026

EuroLeague | Best Lineups (min. 100 possessions)

Some lineups don't just work, they dominate.

🟢 Panathinaikos
Shorts – Nunn – Osman – Hernangomez – Holmes
Score: 72 - 38
NET Rating: +67
Possessions: 105
• Nunn: 40.4 pts / 100 poss
• Shorts: 17.3 ast / 100 poss
• Holmes & Hernangomez: 17.2% REB%

🔴 Olympiacos
Walkup – Dorsey – Papanikolaou – Vezenkov – Milutinov
Score: 187 - 119
NET Rating: +51
Possessions: 258
• Vezenkov: 45.4 pts / 100 poss
• Dorsey: 43.1 pts / 100 poss
• Walkup: 12.3 ast / 100 poss
• Milutinov: 17.8% REB%

⚪ Real Madrid
Campazzo – Abalde – Deck – Lyles – Tavares
Score: 215 - 182
NET Rating: +49
Possessions: 185
• Lyles: 47.3 pts / 100 poss
• Campazzo: 11.0 ast / 100 poss
• Deck & Tavares: 15.1% REB%

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10/01/2026

With the standings being this close, this might be the most important chart to look at right now.

It shows Strength of Schedule - basically how tough each team's remaining games are
(the higher a team is, the tougher the schedule ahead).

📉 Barça, Baskonia and Valencia still have a very rough road to the end.
📈 Virtus and Dubai have already gone through the hardest part of their schedule.

08/01/2026

Quiz time 👀
Who is shooting?

13/09/2025

🏀 points scored by country (so far):

🇩🇪 826
🇺🇸 774 🙃
🇫🇮 697
🇬🇷 660
🇸🇮 644

USA ruled 2022, but in Germany leads, and the scoring crown finally sticks to Europe.

A bit of context: Cyprus added some extra points to Greece and Germany thanks to Simitzis (first passport GRE) and Aeneas Jung (first passport GER).

For reference, here’s the 2022 leader-board:
🇺🇸 656
🇷🇸 484
🇸🇮 464
🇩🇪 456
🇱🇹 439

Note: country = player’s first passport (as listed by their last club).

08/06/2025

🚀 Just launched: what I believe is the most advanced shooting analysis tool in the market - and I mean that literally.

If you’re used to basic “above/below average” shot charts… this goes way beyond that.

👇 Here's what sets it apart:

📌 Multiple Stat Modes
View shot data as:
• Shooting %
• Made shots
• Attempts
• Assisted baskets (made after a pass - very rare!)
You decide what matters: efficiency, volume, or role context.

📌 Clean Court Zoning + Full League Comparison
We split the court into 11 clear zones and compare each player's/team’s performance against every other player/team in the league.
No more vague labels - this is real bench-marking.

📌 Powerful Filters for Real Scenarios
You can filter by:
• Last N games
• Home/away
• Game period (e.g. just 4th quarter)
• When specific players or lineups are ON or OFF the court

You can literally ask: How does Team A shoot when Player X is off the floor?

📌 Built for Coaches, Analysts, Scouts, and Nerds
Whether you're preparing for a match-up or evaluating your own team, this tool gives you clarity - not just heat-maps and guesses.

💡 It’s part of 3StepsBasket PRO.

And honestly:
If you can find a better shooting tool out there, I’ll give you a PRO subscription for free - just to prove you wrong.

Try it now: https://pro.3stepsbasket.com

25/04/2025

In his IG stories, DPG wondered how often Pukl and Radovic officiate Olympiacos games.
Such questions feel like an assist to me - so here we go.

📌 Pukl has officiated 25 EuroLeague games this season.
- 4 of them were Olympiacos games (Olympiacos won all 4).
- 1 was a Panathinaikos game (PANA won that one).

📌 Radovic has officiated 25 EuroLeague games this season as well.
- 4 of them were Olympiacos games (Olympiacos won 3 out of 4).
- 4 of them were Panathinaikos games (PANA won 2 of them).

Here is the list of the most frequent referee - team pairings this EuroLeague season (7 games each):
📌 Mogulkoc - Barcelona
📌 Peruga - Partizan
📌 Perez Niz - Fenerbahçe
📌 Pukl - Real Madrid
📌 Peruga - Panathinaikos
📌 Difallah - Baskonia
📌 Difallah - Bayern Munich

💢😳 Panathinaikos owner Dimitris Giannakopoulos protests for the calls in Game 2 and threatens to leave EuroLeague!