The EuroLeague Women play-ins continue with several crucial matchups

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Sevgi Uzun and Fenerbahçe Opet started the play-ins strong with a convincing win over Spar Girona. | Anadolu via Getty Images

The EuroLeague Women play-ins may have just started, but they’ve already given fans plenty to cheer for.

From Basket Landes’ massive comeback and near-upset of Galatasaray Çağdaş Faktoring or Casademont Zaragoza’s road victory over the defending EuroLeague champions ZVVZ USK Praha, last week’s series-opening games weren’t lacking for excitement, and there’s more on the way as the series shift locations.

As a reminder, the play-ins are sorted into two categories.

The four teams playing in the semifinal play-ins have already qualified for the Final Six, which will be held in April; the four teams playing in the quarterfinal play-ins, meanwhile, are competing for the right to join them. Thus, the quarterfinal play-ins have a little more at stake, since the losing teams will be eliminated from the competition.

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All four of this week’s play-in games will be played this Wednesday, February 25, and they’ll all be streamed live and for free on FIBA’s EuroLeague Women YouTube channel. Here’s everything we’ll be watching for in these crucial matchups.

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Wednesday, February 25​

Galatasaray Çağdaş Faktoring (1-0) vs. Basket Landes (0-1) (semifinal play-in)​

• When: 1:30 p.m. ET
• Where: Espace François-Mitterrand in Mont-de-Marsan, France
• How to watch:FIBA YouTube live stream
• Players to watch: Elizabeth Williams, Dorka Juhász, Awak Kuier, Kamiah Smalls (Galatasaray Çağdaş Faktoring); Leïla Lacan, Julie Wojta, Murjanatu Musa (Basket Landes)
• Matchup details: Landes notched yet another dramatic moment in their Cinderella season last week when they overcame a 19-point fourth-quarter deficit to force overtime, though Galatasaray did hang on in the extra period to take the 1-0 series lead. Williams, Juhász and Kuier all recorded double-doubles in that game, and despite Landes’ rebounding prowess as a team, it was clear that they just don’t have the size to match up against Galatasaray individually. If Landes is going to keep this series alive, they’re going to have to be more efficient offensively; last week, they struggled to get quality shots against Galatasaray’s frontcourt, shooting just 33.3 percent on 2-pointers and 23.1 on threes. Galatasaray, meanwhile, needs to just keep doing what they’ve been doing, though they could stand to make a few more free throws. They shot 25-for-39 (64.1 percent) from the stripe last week, which kept the door open for Landes’ comeback attempt.

Fenerbahçe Opet (1-0) vs. Spar Girona (0-1) (semifinal play-in)​

• When: 1:30 p.m. ET
• Where: Pavelló Fontajau in Girona, Spain
• How to watch:FIBA YouTube live stream
• Players to watch: Emma Meesseman, Kayla McBride, Gabby Williams, Julie Allemand, Iliana Rupert, Sevgi Uzun (Fenerbahçe Opet); Justė Jocytė, Chloe Bibby, Arica Carter, Mariam Coulibaly, Klara Holm (Spar Girona)
• Matchup details: It was business as usual last week for Fenerbahçe, who initially found themselves in a tight game against Girona before pulling away in the second half. Fenerbahçe augmented their usual excellence in the halfcourt with 16 steals and 31 fast break points, so it’s safe to say that Girona will try to take better care of the basketball this week without compromising their pace of play. That will be easier said than done, of course, though Girona is currently second among the league’s remaining teams in turnovers per game (14.8), so it’s realistic to expect them to play a cleaner game this time around. Whether their defense can stop Fenerbahçe is another issue entirely; the Turkish club leads EuroLeague Women by a country mile in both scoring volume (84.5 points per game) and efficiency (51.8 percent shooting), so Girona will need to find a way to be disruptive enough on defense to give themselves a chance.

ZVVZ USK Praha (0-1) vs. Casademont Zaragoza (1-0) (quarterfinal play-in)​

• When: 2 p.m. ET
• Where: Pabellón Príncipe Felipe in Zaragoza, Spain
• How to watch:FIBA YouTube live stream
• Players to watch: Janelle Salaün, Bridget Carleton, Sania Feagin, Valeriane Ayayi, Maite Cazorla, Pauline Astier (ZVVZ USK Praha); Carla Leite, Stephanie Mawuli, Helena Pueyo, Mariona Ortiz, Nadia Fingall (Casademont Zaragoza)
• Matchup details: Zaragoza soundly outplayed Praha last week in a wire-to-wire victory and will now get the opportunity to close things out at home. Neither team shot the 3-pointer as well as they’d have liked in their series opener, but Zaragoza was extremely efficient from inside the arc (66.7 percent shooting) and made 19 free throws to Praha’s eight. The defending champs, meanwhile, were uncharacteristically flat and clearly missing Brionna Jones’ post presence. Praha now needs to find a different route for scoring, and that will ideally come through Carleton and Salaün. As we saw during group play, both players are perfectly capable of dropping 20 points or more on any given day, and without much of an interior game, Praha will be depending on them to keep their playoff hopes alive.

Umana Reyer Venezia (0-1) vs. Beretta Famila Schio (1-0) (quarterfinal play-in)​

• When: 2 p.m. ET
• Where: Palazzetto Livio Romare in Schio, Italy
• How to watch:FIBA YouTube live stream
• Players to watch: Kaila Charles, Lorela Cubaj, Joyner Holmes, Stephanie Mavunga, Ivana Dojkic (Umana Reyer Venezia); Jessica Shepard, Cecilia Zandalasini, Kitija Laksa, Marième Badiane, Maria Conde, Anete Steinberga (Beretta Famila Schio)
• Matchup details: Last week’s game between these two Italian clubs wasn’t decided until the final seconds, so it wouldn’t be a surprise if we got another back-and-forth contest this week. Schio is now 3-0 against Venezia this season (two of those wins came in Italian league play), and they’ll be favored to close things out on their home court due to their advantages on offense. Venezia did a decent enough job at keeping Schio at bay last week and led for the majority of the game, but was unable to match their opponents’ efficiency from the 3-point line; that’s not a strength of Venezia’s roster anyway, so they’ll have to be aggressive on defense and on the boards to even things up.

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