There regular season ends at Pala Radi in Cremona. Olimpia plays for several reasons. Success would guarantee her the advantage of home advantage both in the quarter-finals and in the eventual final, as well as keeping alive the residual, minimal, hopes of reaching the record. By winning they would finish the second round with a promising balance of 13-2 and their seventh consecutive victory. For the rest, it is another match to get closer to the playoffs and with the possibility of returning after two weeks of stoppage also Nikola Mirotic, albeit with a mini-cut restriction. Which makes the team finally complete with the only exception, of course, of Billy Baron. Cremona is safe and has no chance of reaching the playoffs, but it is coming off a wonderful season and above all at home it has often been able to claim illustrious victims, including Virtus Bologna.
NOTE – Vanoli Cremona-EA7 Emporio Armani Milano will be played on Sunday 5 May at 6.15pm in Cremona with live streaming on DAZN.
THE REFEREES – Manuel Attard, Andrea Valzani, Martino Galasso.
COACH MARIO FIORETTI – “We are playing against one of the revelation teams of this championship, a team that has beaten or put everyone they have faced at home in difficulty. We will have to be able to maintain good ball circulation against both their man and zone defense. In defense we will have to stay concentrated for 24 seconds in each possession as Cremona is capable of playing as a team and creating baskets even from situations away from the ball.”
WHAT COULD HAPPEN – Olimpia enters the last day of the championship first in the standings on equal points with Virtus Bologna but penalized by the points difference in head-to-head matches. If Milan and Bologna obtain the same result on the last day, regardless of the result in Brescia, the ranking would remain unchanged: 1. Bologna; 2. Milan; 3. Brescia; 4. Venice. To get there first, Olimpia must win in Cremona and count on Virtus’s home defeat against Trento at the same time. By winning in Cremona, she will mathematically be at least second. They would lose second place to Brescia in the event of Germani’s defeat and victory over Brindisi.
WHICH OPPONENT? – If it finished first, Olimpia would face the eighth in the ranking which in this case would necessarily be Tortona (Milan is first only if Trento wins in Bologna). Finishing second, Olimpia would face the seventh which will be Trento if Tortona, losing in Treviso, is unable to reach and overcome it; it will be Tortona if they win in Treviso with the simultaneous defeat of Trento in Bologna. By finishing third, they would face sixth in the standings which is currently Pistoia and would remain so if they beat Varese at home or in the event of Trento’s defeat in Bologna.
Olimpia Milano press office
