Although O Panathinaikos he once again made a noble effort to shine in his absence, he will not miss the most traditional meeting of Greek sports, which for almost three decades has been nothing more than his pair with Olympic in the finals of the basketball championship. Since the early 90s, when the two “eternal rivals” came out again, breaking the dominance of Ahri and PAOK, there are rare cases when they do not form a pair of finals hand in hand. Between 1991 and 1992 to date, at least one of the two have qualified for the final, with the characteristic that they had 13 pairs in a row from 2005 to 2018, when Olympiacos decided to pull the rope … to the end, with his voluntary downgrade to category A2.

These two years were the last that Panathinaikos won the title easily, as expected, as they had opponents Prometheus and Lavrio and not one of the other traditional Greek basketball teams. Upon return to basketball league The Red-Whites beat him last season by winning the final 3-0 on a grand scale, a scenario that is unlikely to happen again. (EuroLeague finalist) Olympiacos reached the final series unbeaten, in contrast to Panathinaikos who set a negative losing record in their modern history, with the characteristic that (like last year against Larissa) it took five games to fly out with 3-2 Peristeri to the semi-final stage.

The “reds and whites” of positive entries welcome the “greens” of negative ones.

And this impressive 13-0 score against the Greens at the Red-Whites over the past two years, and the big difference in their competitive image, heralds another uneven match…

The series starts on Sunday at SEF and is measured by three wins (five games maximum), with Olympiacos having the home advantage. The required matches will be played in Sunday-Thursday order in SEF and OAKA respectively, starting at 21.15. The day before, on Saturday and Wednesday, respectively, the games of the small final Peristeri – PAOK will take place, starting at 19.15.