EUROLEAGUE WOMEN – Fowles dunks way to All-Star Game MVP
Numerous players that took part in last year’s FIBA World Championship for Women were on show at the EuroLeague Women All-Star Game in Gdynia, Poland, on Tuesday where a Rest of the World side beat Team Europe, 116-88.
In a game with virtually no defense, the Rest of the World raced into a 40-24 lead by the end of the first quarter and stayed in front the rest of the way. Olympic and world champion Sylvia Fowles of Team USA and Galatasaray, was voted MVP of the game.
Fowles had 16 points and had a breakaway slam-dunk late in the contest. Fellow American and Nadezhda center Tina Charles missed a dunk but did hit a few three-pointers from nine attempts.
Charles missed her only shot from the arc during this season’s EuroLeague Women. Play was stopped shortly after the opening tip so the Czech Republic’s Hana Horakova, the MVP of the FIBA World Championship, could receive her FIBA Europe Women’s Player of the Year award in front of the fans.
At half-time, the Czech Republic’s Katerina Elhotova of ZVVZ USK Prague and Team Europe, won a three-point shooting contest, edging Pecs’ Alexandria Quigley. In Gdynia on Monday, FIBA Europe announced that the Final Four will be hosted by UMMC Ekaterinburg in Russia the weekend of April 8-10.
UMMC will take on four-time defending champions and fellow Russian Sparta&K M.R. Vidnoje in one semi-final while Halcon Avenida will go up against Ros Casares in an all-Spanish battle in the other. FIBA Europe also revealed the Final Four format will be scrapped after this year and there will be a Final Eight competition beginning season that will start with two groups of four teams.
