Great Britain fell 77-67 at the hands of Greece on the road on Sunday afternoon at the PAOK Sports Arena in EuroBasket 2025 qualifiers, splitting the series 1-1 in this window.
Greece led for all but 52 seconds of the contest, as GB were unable to overcome 28 turnovers and fell to 2-2 in Group F, meaning they will need to almost certainly win the head-to-head with Netherlands in February to advance.
Myles Hesson had 14 points to lead GB, Quinn Ellis had another strong performance with 13 points, four rebounds, five assists and three steals, while Gabe Olaseni added 12.
“This isn’t the result we wanted but there’s a lot of takeaways both positive and negative,” Olaseni said.
“The main thing is 27 turnovers is unacceptable when you’re trying to win on the road in a tough environment.”
Kostas Papanikolaou led Greece with 14 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists.
GB were also without Akwasi Yeboah who has become a key contributor over the past two windows.
“I’d like to think where our team and programme is – with a really good mix of experienced internationals and younger developing players – I’d like to think our guys will reflect upon that with some really controllable areas of the performance and think we should have put ourselves in a better position to make the outcome closer,” Head Coach Marc Steutel commented after the defeat.
“Particularly with how many turnovers we had in the game.
“…I’d like to think in 89 minutes against Greece that we’ve ended their respect in how we play. FOr sure we will go away, look at the performance and think how we can reflect and improve and continue to gain respect on this level.
“We’re on our own journey, we know what we’re trying to achieve here with EuroBasket and I think we took steps forward in this window and hopefully we’ll do that when we compete again in 85 days in the window in February.”
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