After a near-perfect start, Fenerbahce seem to have jammed / News - Basketnews.com

Fenerbahce struggle to find their early season groove, as they have now lost 7 of the last 10 games. BasketNews tries to analyze some of the reasons behind the struggles that Fenerbahce experience.

Credit: Imago Images - Scanpix Credit Imago Images - Scanpix

Up to this point, the EuroLeague season has been absolutely exciting and surprising. Everything is still up for grabs. We currently have in the playoff picture teams that weren't exactly supposed to be there at the beginning of the season.

2-pointers this season

57%21,2Points made:21,2Accuracy:57,2%Place in standings:3Record max:33Record min:11Most made 2FGs:Johnathan MotleyTeamEuroLeagueStatisticsSchedule

At the same time, teams that were supposed to be among the main contenders for the EuroLeague title are struggling mightily: reigning champions Anadolu Efes are currently out of the playoff zone. However, they still have the chance to recover, and Italian side Emporio Armani Milan find themselves near the bottom of the standings.

Ups and downs are not that uncommon in such a long season, and that's something that Fenerbahce Beko Istanbul have been learning pretty fast in the last few weeks.

Last summer, Fenerbahce went through a major overhaul of the roster, adding players like Nick Calathes, Scottie Wilbekin, Jonathan Motley, and Carsen Edwards.

The Turkish club also decided to part ways with coach Sasha Djordjevic and hire Dimitris Itoudis. Under the guidance of Itoudis, Fenerbahce looked almost unstoppable at the beginning of the season.

Their defense was super effective, and offensively the combination of Calathes, Wilbekin, and Motley was working superbly.

The Turkish club had 9 wins in the first 10 games of the EuroLeague regular season, losing only one game on the road against Barcelona. The team coached by Dimitris Itoudis reached the month of December with a record of 10 wins and just two defeats.

It looked like everything was almost perfect, and the club would enjoy a superb regular season, cruising quickly to a top-four spot in the playoffs.

However, in December, the situation started to change. After the big win on December 8 against ALBA Berlin, Fener lost three games in a row against Olympiacos on the road and then against Baskonia and Partizan Belgrade at home.

Fenerbahce Beko Istanbul / Schedule

Fenerbahce Beko Istanbul Olympiacos Piraeus73-93 Fenerbahce Beko Istanbul ALBA BerlinFri17:45

Overall, Fenerbahce lost 7 of their 10 games -- a completely different performance than in the early months of the regular season.

For a moment, let's try to use the Round 15 game against Partizan Belgrade, played on December 22, as a clear break in the season of Fenerbahce.

That game was the last one played by Tonye Jekiri before he underwent surgery to recover from an inguinal injury that had bothered him for a while.

Fener lost that game 73-72 after a close battle against Partizan. Until that game, Fenerbahce had the best defensive rating in the entire Euroleague (108.0).

The defensive schemes created by coach Itoudis were working exceptionally well. Jekiri, of course, had an essential role in protecting the rim, making Fener's defense particularly effective close to the basket.

The Nigerian big man might not be the flashiest player in the competition, but he's really good at what he does best: grabbing rebounds, protecting the rim, and rolling to the basket.

From Round 15 to today, Fenerbahce's defensive effectiveness has completely collapsed. The Turkish team went from having the best defensive rating to being last with Baskonia and ASVEL, with a defensive rating of 120.7, a deterioration of more than 12 points in just over a month.

Sure, this defensive collapse cannot be connected exclusively to the absence of Jekiri, but losing the Nigerian big man played a part in this process.

On the perimeter, the closeouts have been less effective, and Fenerbahce now allow more three-pointers -- something that they had avoided very well at the beginning of the season, with their defense focusing on protecting the perimeter as much as they could.

Even in this case, the numbers are pretty clear: Fenerbahce allowed only an average of 77.06 points per game in the first 15 games of the season, while in the last 7 games, that number has risen to an average of 87.85 points per game.

But since defense and offense in basketball are closely related, the defensive crisis that Fenerbahce is living through has also negatively affected their offense.

In the first 15 games of the EuroLeague regular season, Fenerbahce had the fifth-best offensive rating with 116.9, the best field goal percentage (50%), and the second-best three-point percentage (39%).

But looking at the last 7 EuroLeague games, the offensive efficiency of coach Itoudis' side hasn't been the same. The Turkish powerhouse now has the fifth-worst offensive rating in the competition (113.1), the third-worst three-point percentage (33%), and the ninth field goal percentage (47%).

Fenerbahce also commit more turnovers than in the first part of the season. In the last 7 games, they have an average of 13.5 turnovers per game, the second-worst in the competition.

The offense is more stagnant and shots from behind the three-point line are not falling. There's less rhythm, and Fenerbahce is often forced to take very contested shots.

The arrival of Kostas Antetokounmpo, who joined the team to cover for the absence of Tonye Jekiri, hasn't produced enough yet, especially on the defensive end.

Antetokounmpo's tendency to quickly pick up fouls has limited his time on the court. So far, the Greek big man averages less than 10 minutes per game on the court.

The offensive star of the team, Scottie Wilbekin, is struggling from a distance. Despite some good scoring performances, the former Maccabi Tel Aviv guard is shooting only 26% from deep in the last 7 games.

Wilbekin was ejected in the first half of the game against Olympiacos after complaining to the referees about a call he didn't like.

He finished the game with 0 points in 11 minutes. In the game against Olympiacos, Fener never looked not even remotely close to giving a real challenge to the Greek team.

Standing at 13 wins and 9 defeats, nothing is compromised for Fenerbahce. They're still in the playoff area and just a couple of wins away from the top of the standings.

However, there are clear signs that what looked like a perfect machine until December is not working with the same efficiency as it used to and needs some adjusting to find the initial groove again.

If there's someone who's more than capable of finding a solution to these issues, that's definitely Dimitris Itoudis.

But with how the EuroLeague season has developed so far, it's better to act fast. You can never know where you'll find yourself in a couple of months. At the end of the day, this looks like the season of surprises, right?

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