«On a good day, we can win everywhere»
The Olympiacos delegation flew to Spain today (March 2), where tomorrow will be playing against Baskonia, for the 27th round of the Euroleague.
Apart from the injured Kostas Papanikolaou and Hassan Martin, our team’s coach, Giorgos Bartzokas, will be denied the services of Giorgos Pritnezis. The experienced forward suffers from a lower back muscle spasm and wasn’t able to travel to Vitoria.
Before the team’s departure, Giorgos Bartzokas was asked if he thinks his team can come back with a win. “Of course we believe we can win. We believe we can win every game. We never thought we cannot be competitive. Of course we are faced with difficulties. Baskonia is a team that plays a really fast pace, they are first in transition points per game. We shall first have to control the game through our offense, have good execution so as to not allow them to play up tempo”.
Asked whether the second half against CSKA will be a kind of guide for Olympiacos in the game against the Basques, he replied: “At times, we have reacted as a team… We have been playing aggressively on both ends of the floor and executing our plan. However, we have some aspects in our game when we are totally on the other side. Consistency is what we’ve been struggling to find since the beginning of the season. Unfortunately, some absences in our roster have denied us the opportunity to succeed with it. However, I think that when on a good day, we can win everywhere”.
About the absences, he said: “Printezis is not traveling due to a muscle spasm and we’ll see if he’s going to be ready for the game against Crvena Zvezda. Papanikolaou and Martin are off, while Koufos is with us and he’s playing”. On whether there’s still faith in the goal of qualifying to the next phase of the competition, he commented: “Since we don’t have the national league that always plays a significant role, the players need to put in a greater effort into staying focused and taking in the meaning of these games. We need to pull through together”.
«We must react»
The American guard, Aaron Harrison, said in view of the game: “We need to react. We know our position, we know we are coming from a losing streak, but we definitely still believe in ourselves. We are going out on the floor and we need to find a way to win. We made a huge come back in the game against CSKA. We have had a lot of energy and we ran a big streak. In professional sports, you need to ‘build’ on things like that, so I think we should be building on it”.
When asked to talk about the keys to the game, he said: “We need to play tougher than them. Baskonia is a team that plays a physical game and they are very athletic. But we also an athletic team, we play well, we play as a team and we are a tough opponent to bring down. We have to come on the floor and fight the hardest we can”.
Finally, on whether the team has faith in its chances at qualifying, despite them being extremely limited, he said: “We have it all. Skill, experienced players… We are not giving up. We need to continue playing and have faith in one another”.