The Polish champs play three of their remaining five games at home and trail fourth-placed Khimki by just two wins. A victory this week would thrust head coach Tomas Pacesas and co. right back into the battle. Khimki meanwhile has dropped two in a row, including 73-65 last week at Zalgiris. However Khimki only trails the top spot by two wins and could take a huge step forward with a road win. Khimki came out on top 82-76 when these teams met on opening night last month as Keith Langford led six Khimki scorers in double figures with 17 points in what proved to be the team’s highest-scoring effort of the season so far. Langford engages in an interesting matchup against his former college teammate J.R. Giddens. Prokom boats a very deep backcourt with Dan Ewing, Bobby Brown and Mike Wilks splitting time. They will go against Khimki’s backcourt of Vitaly Fridzon, Raul Lopez and Zoran Planinic. Filip Videnov and Piotr Szczotka help out for the hosts on the wings, where they will meet Langford and perhaps Sergey Monya when Khimki head coach Sergio Scariolo opts for a big lineup. Inside, Prokom has used Ratko Varda, Adam Hrycaniuk and Adam Lapeta at center as well as Ronnie Burrell and the sweet-shooting Jan Jagla at power forward. Khimki has old-school centers to match p with Prokom’s bigs in Ben Eze and Alekksey Savrasenko, while Monya and Kresimir Loncar offer size ane shooting ability from the “four.” Prokom’s assist-to-turnover ratio is a paltry 1-to-2 this season, which is worst in the Euroleague and something that must change immediately to have a real chance at winning. Khimki will look to be aggressive at both ends and try to maximize Planinic’s height advantage over the smaller Prokom guards. Both teams will give it their all in this pivotal Group A battle that should be an exciting 40 minutes.

REFEREES: Juan Carlos Garcia Gonzalez, Sreten Radovic, Renaud Geller


Game notes, Asseco Prokom Gdynia

Ratko Varda spent part of the 2008-09 season playing for BC Khimki. He helped the team reach the Eurocup final. Among the current BC Khimki players that Varda was teammates with are Vitaly Fridzon, Viacheslav Zaytsev and Sergey Logachev.

Varda scored a Euroleague career-high 17 points against Khimki in Week 1.

Dan Ewing made his European basketball debut with BC Khimki in the 2007-08 season. Ewing was a teammate of current Khimki player Vitaly Fridzon that season and helped the club with the 2008 Russian Cup.

Mike Wilks played briefly for Montepaschi Siena during the 2007-08 season and was a teammate there of BC Khimki center Benjamin Eze.

J.R. Giddens was a teammate of BC Khimki swingman Keith Langford during college for two seasons at the University of Kansas.

Giddens leads all Euroleague players shorter than 2.00 meters in rebounds this season. Giddens, who is 1.96 meters tall, is 11th in the league with 6 rebounds per game.

Giddens made his Euroleague debut and recorded 20 points and 10 rebounds in Week 1 against BC Khimki.

Prokom has dished the fewest assists (8 apg.) of any team in the Euroleague this season.

Game notes, BC Khimki Moscow Region

Keith Langford had his best game of the season and was named week MVP last year in his first meeting with Asseco Prokom. Langford scored 20 points, dished a Euroleague-career-high 9 assists and even blocked 2 shots en route to a 38 index in an 89-67 Khimki win last November.

Langford leads the Euroleague with an average of 6.6 fouls drawn per game.

Ben Eze is 6 blocked shots behind Maceo Baston for seventh place on the list of Euroleague shot blockers. He boasts 94 career blocks in 95 Euroleague games.

Eze has played the most minutes (129) of any player in the Euroleague this season without delivering an assist.

Raul Lopez has at least 1 steal in each of his last 14 Euroleague appearances.

Lopez has played the most minutes (112) of any player in the Euroleague this season without attempting a free throw.

Vitaly Fridzon has made at least 1 three-pointer in each of his last 13 Euroleague games.

Thomas Kelati was a teammate of Asseco Prokom reserves Iwo Kitzinger and Robert Witka during the 2007-08 season at Polish side PGE Turow Zgorzelec. Together they led the club to the Eurocup Final Eight in the team’s maiden European appearance.

TOMAS PACESAS, Asseco Prokom head coach:

— For sure we have to play faster than we have in our previous games. We have to look for some easy points, then our chance to win will be bigger. We know our strengths, but they are a very good team and it is not easy to use them against such good players. Like I said before, we have to try play faster and control the tempo and the rhythm of the game.

FILIP VIDENOV, Asseco Prokom forward:

— The first and the most important condition is to be a team on both sides of the basketball court. If we will do that, we have a chance to win. We have lost two games against Khimki, but now we play on our home court and it is a great chance to take revenge, we just have to change the way we play.

SERGIO SCARIOLO, BC Khimki head coach:

— We start the second round of Euroleague with high motivation to improve our performances. We were not lucky in some very close games, we had many physical problems in the first round, but there is no excuse. We hope to start the second round better, but it's gonna be very difficult to play on Prokom’s home court against a talented, experienced team with high scoring potential. We must play extremely well on defense to win. I hope we will show character in the last minutes to have not only 35 minutes of good basketball, but a complete game of 40 minutes.

FEDOR DMITRIEV, BC Khimki forward:

— This season we have already played Asseco Prokom twice: in Euroleague and the VTB United League. In the VTB League game, we won without any problems, but in the championship of the strongest European clubs, it was more difficult to play Prokom. The team ranks in the last place in our group, nevertheless I’m sure at home they will try to make their fans happy. The game will not be easy. No one has laid his cards on the table.