The experienced guard stepped up in the absences of Walkup and Vildoza
Nigel Williams-Goss helped Olympiacos hit the right notes in Paris
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Regular Season
Round 25 of 34
Group Regular Season
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Both Thomas Walkup and Luca Vildoza have stayed back in Greece during this double-round week, yet their absence didn’t have much of an impact on Olympiacos Piraeus against Paris Basketball, in large part thanks to Nigel Williams-Goss.
The 30-year-old floor manager stepped up big time on both ends, leading his team to an important 73-90 road win that also saw the Reds secure the tiebreaker advantage over Paris. Williams-Goss pulled off a complete outing, finishing the game with 14 points, 6 rebounds, 3 assists, 1 steal and not a single turnover, despite running the team for as many as 35.53 minutes – the longest he has spent on the court in a game so far this season.
More importantly, 7 of his points came in the last six and a half minutes, with Williams-Goss coming to the fore when it mattered most. Olympiacos led by as many as 20 points in the first half, but Paris was anything but willing to give up.
The hosts outscored the Reds 27-19 in the third quarter, with TJ Shorts scoring a layup in transition to bring his team within 65-71 with 6:49 minutes left on the clock. Enter Williams-Goss, who responded with a smooth floater on the other end to begin a 2-11 run that saw him drain a triple and go 2 for 2 from the line to give Olympiacos a 67-82 cushion with 3:10 remaining.
The Greek side took their revenge after losing 90-96 at home back in December, with Sasha Vezenkov and Evan Fournier shining in yet another game. The former went 7 for 10 on field goals to record 23 points and a PIR of 30, with the Frenchman adding 18 points. Vezenkov has now scored in double digits in each of the 23 times he’s stepped on the floor this season and Fournier had done so in 18 of his last 19 games.
“They kicked our a** in the first game,” Fournier told EuroLeague TV after Wednesday’s clash. “They surprised us a little bit. It ended up being a close game, but they were up 20 in the fourth quarter and there was no way we were going to let them do that again. We matched their intensity. We matched their physicality. Rebounded the ball pretty well. They still got too many second chances, but overall it was a good job.”
The Reds opened the last double-round week of the season with a hard-fought victory in France, two days before their upcoming clash away at FC Barcelona. With both Walkup and Vildoza out injured, Olympiacos will lean again on Williams-Goss to run the team from the point guard position – something that he demonstrated he can do pretty well as a starter, too.