London, Wednesday 12 November — The London Lions produced a complete performance at the Copper Box Arena, powering past Panionios Athens 97–72 in a game that quickly shifted from competitive to commanding.

After a close first quarter, London exploded on both ends of the floor, stringing together long defensive stands, pushing the tempo, and turning stops into scoring runs that Athens simply couldn’t withstand.

Panionios Head Coach Ilias Zouros didn’t mince words afterward, admitting his team had no answers defensively.

“Congratulations to the team of the Lions, they deserved it, they were very good. We played extremely badly…defensively we didn’t exist. Many mistakes, many misunderstandings…You play defense like that, it's hard to compete,” said Head Coach Zouros.

London settled in after a back-and-forth start, using Scott’s early threes and Adamu’s attacks to take a 24–18 lead after one.

The second quarter broke the game open as Williams, Scott, and Adamu fueled a dominant run that pushed the margin to 20 by halftime.

London then shut the door in the third, holding Athens to just 13 points while piling on with transition plays and timely threes to extend the lead past 30.

The Lions controlled the fourth comfortably, highlighted by Ryan Mikesell’s energetic return and eight quick points as London closed out a complete, wire-to-wire performance.

Lions Head Coach Tautvydas Sabonis praised his team’s commitment to the game plan, especially on the defensive end.

“Very good performance from my guys. They understood the task at hand…holding them to 18, 17 and 13. The team understood the plan, they executed, and I’m happy we did a good job defensively,” said Coach Sabonis.

Forward Joel Scott echoed that message, highlighting the team’s identity.

“We understood that our identity is our defense. Everyone was locked in on the scout and the little things — it showed and we got the outcome we wanted,” said Scott.

With momentum building, the Lions now turn their attention to domestic play as they travel to face the Cheshire Phoenix this Sunday in Super League Basketball action.