By Yarone Arbel

Week 4 of the regular season phase in the EuroChallenge saw another pack of exciting events.

Three of the four unbeaten teams - Belgacom Liege Basket, Cholet Basket and Virtus Bologna - qualified already to the next phase.

Meanwhile two teams earned their debut win in the competition - CSK-VVS Samara of Russia and Keravnos of Cyprus, and will try to use the momentum and save the season in the remaining weeks.

Group E will focus a lot of attention as its the only group with four teams who share the same 2-2 record entering the break, before the two last games of the phase to decide the qualifiers.  

The Good News

Fred is in the House

The top scorer of the EuroChallenge so far is Lokomotiv Rostov's Fred House. The US swingman seems fond of playing against Ukranian side BC Sumykhimprom. In the first leg he scored 30 points with five two-point shots in ten attempts and just a single miss from long range out of seven shots. This week he had "only" 26 points with a mirror shooting chart. He scored five times from distance on 50% while missing just a single shot inside the arc, this time out of four attempts. House was everywhere on the court in the closing quarter, when Rostov didn't allow the locals to come closer. House scored seven points and dished two assists, to have direct responsibility to 11 out of his team's 23 fourth quarter points.

Galatasaray need no stars

It was already mentioned here that Galatasaray suffers a big difference between home and road games since day one of the season. This week they finally put an end to it with an 82-78 win in Zagreb over the local gang of Ante Tomic and friends. The irony is that in the off-season the Turkish club made three big moves with the signings of Andrija Zizic, Dejan Milojevic and Milan Gurovic. All three for a different reason, missed the game in Zagreb, and Coach Murat Ozyer found the way to win with his back-ups. Three domestic players stepped up - Cuneyt Erden reached double-digits for the first time, and scored a season high of 14 points. Erdem Turetken scored 11 with just a single missed shot in addition to five rebounds and three steals. Veteran center Huseyin Besok came one rebound shy of his third double-double of the season with 17 points, nine boards and one block to cap a great performance of the true soul of Galatasaray.

Makeover of the week

Since there's no official "Makeover of the Week" award, here's a chance to give away one to Cajasol's Nik Caner-Medley for one heck of a change in seven days. The American forward joined the Spanish side only recently and his debut in the EuroChallenge was last week when his team lost to Ventspils 78-70. Caner-Medley finished that night with four points after missing all his five attempts from long range. This week, when Cajasol smashed Energa Czarni Slupsk on the road 83-53, he was the main man. On his way to the new award he posted 22 points in a near perfect performance of 10 made shots out of 11 attempts.

The Bad News

Ne pas Bonn

The Cypriot club of Keravnos earned their first win in the EuroChallenge, and it came in a very unique way. The final result shows a 73-64 triumph, but the second quarter, where the visitors of Telekom Baskets Bonn were anything but playing basketball, made the difference.  The second quarter score was 18-7, but it was beyond just numbers. The teams finished the first period with the locals leading 20-18, but after less than five minutes they added seven unanswered points. In that period of time Telekom turned the ball over four times and missed four shots. That poor performance forced former star and current head coach Michael Koch to change the entire line-up, not an everyday scene on the courts. All five players went to the bench, and that made a bit of a difference. From that point till the buzzer the score was 11-7, as all the points of Telekom were scored by big guy Ken Johnson. Since Johnson isn't known for his offensive skills, it's not surprising all of his baskets in that period were a result of an assist by one of the guards, on the way to a big night and season high of 21 points. The Germans turned the ball over just once more, but finished the half down by 13,enough for Keravnos to hold on for the win.

The other side of the fence

Last week Triumph Lyubertsy appeared on the Good News side after a big run in the closing minutes of the game saved them from a disturbing home loss to BC Kalev. This week they are on the other side of the fence. Triumph traveled to Kyiv with a 67-64 win from the game in Moscow, and eventually lost 66-65, but had the game in their hands. With 3:18 to play Kyiv were behind 65-54, which should be more than enough, yet Triumph suffered a 12-0 run by the locals in the closing minutes that turned the game over. The Russian club missed all five shots and turned the ball over three times in that period, while Kyiv was near perfection. Four different players scored in that run, that was summed by a big play by Goran Jeretin. With 27 seconds on the clock the Montenegrin guard stole the ball and drove quickly for a lay up to cap the run and put his team on top. That was the third steal of the hosts during the run, but the first they converted to quick points. Just in time.

Frankfurt curse

On Yahoo! Answers you can find a page where it is explained that in the game of basketball "The object is the ball, the objective is to put the ball in the rim." Perhaps that page should be printed and glued to the boards in the arena of Deutsch Bank Skyliners in Frankfurt. For the second week in a row the fans who attend the game in Frankfurt get the impression their team isn't really connected to that objective of the game. Last week their local team lost 66-58 to BC Kyiv, while this week came a 61-57 victory over BC Kalev Cramo. In both games Frankfurt displayed a terrible shooting day. Their total of both games stand on 31 out of 73 from two-point range and nine out of 40 from the longer range. In total field goal percentages it's an ugly 35%. Add to that less than 62% from the charity stripe this week, and you start to wonder if "Put the ball in the rim" sounds too complicated in German.