Bartzokas: “It’s not an easy game and I’m not saying it to avoid pressure”

Realistic, down-to-earth and confident that the work that will be required later in the season is even greater, George Bartzokas explained the importance of Thomas Wokap’s absence in the Olympiacos-Anadolu Efes game before discussing the competition at length hard character that the EuroLeague has.

Details of George Bartzokas’ statements:

“Congratulations to the children, to the world that has helped us so much. It was a tough game, as we expected. I said every game is important and crucial, so tonight we saw misplaced layups, misplaced open shots, mistakes. Anadolu Efes’ quality counts at every point and in every position, but I think we had a lot of chances to end the game in the regular season. What happened happened. We won in that special way, with Sloukas’ shot at the end of overtime, so congratulations to everyone.

I feel blessed to coach these players. It’s very important for us to overcome the falls we had while losing our best regional defender in the last phase of yesterday’s training. Efes have a lot of good players on the periphery, Wokap’s absence was crucial but everyone tried to make up for his loss in defence. We have Lavrio on Monday. From the beginning of the year we focus on our team game. We make two wins, everyone says we will win the Euroleague. We make two defeats, there is a crisis. Even in 2013, when we won the Euroleague, there is no case that a whole year goes by like the wind for a team. He must learn and cope with both victories and defeats.

Our goal is the octave, which is not that easy. There is no easy game. We label Euroleague away games as games not to be missed. I’m talking about the game with Basconia. I’m not saying that to avoid the pressure we’re under anyway, but because that’s the reality. Every win counts, we have 14 games at the moment and a number of games ahead of us. At the end we will create our report. We can’t rely on one or two players, but overall everyone has to be able to live up to expectations.

If you play well on defense, you can win games. Shooting is also very important. My conclusion is that teams that shoot well win. In world basketball, you see how many shots are made with the three-pointer. There is a lack of high-level Post players in Europe. Consistently scoring from the periphery brings wins. We didn’t play that well in defence, so we can still do better things. Some were tired while we had two games in Spain and one game against Aris a few days ago. At the moment it is important to manage our physical preparedness and our psyche in order to be prepared for the great challenges that lie ahead“.