Basketball(Boys and girls at same sites unless otherwise indicated)

Thursday

Hanau at Wiesbaden; Heidelberg at Mannheim.

Friday

Lakenheath at American Community School-Cobham; Brussels and Rota at Alconbury; SHAPE at Menwith Hill; International School of Brussels at Ramstein; Baumholder at Hohenfels; Bitburg at Vilseck; Black Forest Academy at Würzburg; Wiesbaden at Patch; Mannheim at Bamberg; Sigonella at Aviano; Naples at Vicenza; Marymount at Milan.

Saturday

Lakenheath vs. The Hague at ACS-Cobham; Brussels and Rota at Alconbury; SHAPE at Menwith Hill; International School of Brussels at Ramstein; Baumholder at Hohenfels; Bitburg at Vilseck; Black Forest Academy at Würzburg; Wiesbaden at Patch; Mannheim at Bamberg; Sigonella at Aviano; Naples at Vicenza; Marymount at Milan.

Tuesday

Bitburg at Kaiseraslautern; Würzburg at Hanau; Wiesbaden boys at Heidelberg; Heidelberg girls at Wiesbaden.

MarksmanshipSaturday

European championships at Patch, 9 a.m.

WrestlingSaturday

At Baumholder—Alconbury, Baumholder, Menwith Hill, Patch, Ramstein.

At Brussels—Bitburg, Brussels, Kaiserslautern, Lakenheath, St. John’s.

At Heidelberg—Ansbach, Hanau, Heidelberg, Mannheim, Vilseck.

At Naples—American Overseas School of Rome, Aviano, Naples, Sigonella, Vicenza.

At Wiesbaden—AFNORTH, Hohenfels, SHAPE, Wiesbaden, Würzburg.

Game of the weekWhat: Naples-Vicenza girls basketball.When: 10 a.m. Saturday.Where: Caserma Ederle post gym, Vicenza.What’s at stake: Control of ASIL destiny.

Two of Italy’s three unbeaten girls teams clash. Still ahead for both teams is fellow unbeaten Aviano, which hosts Sigonella (2-6) this weekend.

Naples and Vicenza, both 3-0 in the league, play Friday and Saturday. Their American Schools in Italy League conference game is Saturday, and by then things should really have heated up.

“Vicenza always expects that the game against Naples will be the most difficult of the year…,” Vicenza coach Garrett Barton wrote Tuesday in an e-mail. “Our girls have been looking forward to (this) game all year.”

Both teams boast prolific scorers in Vicenza’s Chakeira Gilbert, Tyler Rivers and Adriona Cleveland, and Naples’ Valentina Lee and Darien Moon. But both coaches see defense as the key.

“Defense will decide the outcome of the games,” Naples coach Craig Lord wrote in his e-mail. “We’ll definitely have to slow down Gilbert and Rivers.”

Echoed Barton, “Our focus will be defense, as usual. We have to stop Moon and Lee. Naples has fast athletes who work hard. We’ll have to keep up with them, slow them down and force turnovers.”

As the defending European D-II champion, Naples poses a significant challenge in that regard. But Lord downplayed the role of experience.

“Three starting seniors from last year won’t make the trip,” he wrote. “We have a new team this year.”

He added that Naples will have to take the floor with more than just Lee and Moon, his most experienced players. “We definitely can’t depend on two players to decide the outcome of these games,” he wrote. “We will need all players to step it up.”

Barton expects they will.

Individual duels and tight defense “should make for a pretty intense game,” he concluded.

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