Monday evening and night decreed which will be the two finals in Italy and in the NBA, two final acts that will see the four teams predicted on the eve of the respective playoffs as protagonists, but also from the beginning of the season, as the most accredited to play for the conquest of the title. Milan-Reggio Emilia and Golden State-Cleveland, these are the two series, which will both start this Friday (at 3 am in America, at 20.45 pm at the Forum), from which the winner of the Italian championship and the one who will wear the 2015/2016 branded ring will emerge, with, in both challenges, on the one hand the formations that from the beginning were obliged to achieve the presence in the final as a minimum objective, Milan and Cleveland (arrived up to now by authority, but with Venice and Toronto who in their respective semifinals tried to scare them , before coming out with their heads held high) and on the other the two most serious candidates to confront them, Reggio Emilia and Golden State (for the latter the term "candidate" is clearly an understatement), both arrived at this last act only after battling for seven games against Avellino and Oklahoma City, respectively.
But let's focus on the business of our house, that is EA7 versus Grissin Bon, with the Milanese, favorites and with the home factor on their side, in the fifth championship final in the eight years of the Armani era (last season they did not reach it, eliminated in the semifinals by the hand of Sassari), while the Emilians return to play for the championship twelve months after the tremendous disappointment of a title seen to fade at the end and finally gone for the first time in history on the Sassari bulletin board. A memory that still burns, but Reggio promptly restarted, in its continuous growth of the last few years, and between the final and the one that is about to play, in the middle it slipped the conquest of the Italian Super Cup, raised right in the face of Milan, and second place at the end of the regular season (halfway through the tournament it had finished leaders).
Olympia, hunting for his 27th championship, after the victory in the Italian Cup, she has the possibility of scoring the fifth brace in her history (curiously all five successes in the national cup were then followed by the triumph in the league) and finally end a season as a true ruler of the country, overshadowing thus the European bankruptcy. A final success that would seem close at hand, given that this Olimpia gives the idea of being the strongest and most solid version of recent years, with, apart from a few shortcomings, a significantly longer roster than its rivals, made up of the right players in the right roles, from Simon to Kalnietis, from Sanders to Batista.
Milan enters this final after overcoming Trento 3-0 and Venice 4-2, a series that saw Gentile and his companions on the rise, capable of going to settle the accounts in the bedlam of Taliercio, but which at the start re-proposed the ugliest version of EA7, trailing first 0-1 and then 1-2, with Reyer failing to deliver the probably decisive blow in the home game-4. Venice which in any case continued to fight until the end, doing everything within its potential, then losing race-6, but with the honor of war and receiving the applause of its fans.
Olimpia will be faced with a Grissin Bon that after having revenge of Sassari in the first round, it got the better of Avellino 4-3, at the end of a balanced and vibrant series, with the Irpinia who didn't give up until the last minute, but where in the end the field factor, never reversed, was at to say the least decisive (both on one side and on the other). Avellino, driven throughout the series by Nunnally, Ragland and Buva, closed a fantastic season, with the Italian Cup final and an exciting second half of the championship, in the end Reggio was stronger, thanks to its compact group of young players Italians, led however by a Lithuanian (but now almost Italian) “old man” by name kaukenas, now thirty-nine but still decisive, as demonstrated by the 17 points of the decisive challenge, and by the PalaBigi factor, practically impregnable (but to hope against Milan he will have to do better even away from home and at least one shot at the Forum will be mandatory).
It starts with the first two matches right at the Assago stadium, Milan arrives with a complete roster (it will be up to the coach to make the best rotations and make no mistake about who to exclude, as happened on a couple of occasions against Venice), while the guests , most harassed in these playoffs by injuries, recover a key player like Veremeenko, but lost to a calf problem Stefano Gentile, who has already finished his season and will not be able to challenge his brother Alessandro, captain of Olimpia and more determined than ever to lift the Scudetto cup for the second time in his career in the family derby.
Milan is stronger, has more alternatives and has the field factor on its side, but it has to eliminate those moments of involution which have often cost it dearly in recent years, Reggio Emilia has shown that it has all the credentials to do well until in the end, but he has to start playing away in the same way as in front of his home crowd. Prediction: 4-2 Milan.
