By Antonis Stroggylakis/ info@eurohoops.net
It was practically impossible for Drew Goudelock to enjoy his best scoring performance following his return from a leg injury that kept him out for more than a month, earlier this season.
Goudelock finished last night’s (5/1) game against Olympiacos with an outing of a season high-tying 20 points, plus 2 assists, and 2 steals but Olimpia Milano fell 87 – 80 in Piraeus.
“We’re losing so nothing really feels good with that,” a visibly frustrated Goudelock told Eurohoops. “Even if we play OK, it doesn’t really feel good. We lost. Nobody cares how you play as an individual, no matter how you play, when you lose.”
This result marked Milano’s 12th defeat in 16 EuroLeague games and plummeted them to the bottom of the standings. With 14 matches remaining, this 4-12 record pretty much puts the team in a dire situation regarding its hopes for making it to the postseason, considering the fact that at least 15 overall wins seem necessary for punching a playoff ticket.
Goudelock admitted that things don’t exactly look bright, but there’s nothing else to do other than continue grinding to exhaust every possibility of an upheaval that might put them once again in hopeful playoff contention.
“For sure it’s tough to look towards the EuroLeague playoffs,” the American guard said to Eurohoops. “We’re not winning as much as we would like to. We got a lot of game taken away from us in the last second and defeats by 1 or 2 points. We’re still trying to build. The coaches tell us to take it every day. Trying to get better and see what happens. So we’ll continue doing that and keep fighting.”
While on paper the recipe isn’t short of quality ingredients, the final result doesn’t translate to wins in EuroLeague. Goudelock can’t explain why the squad isn’t clicking enough as a unit, despite having all the tools for it.
“It’s hard to say. I don’t know honestly. We have a very good team. Very good players. We have everything we need. For whatever reason, our chemistry doesn’t always work out.”
The previous week, Goudelock himself, along with backcourt mate Jordan Theodore, came under criticism by head coach Simone Pianigiani, following the loss to Crvena Zvezda in Milan.
In the post-game presser, Pianigiani mentioned that his two starting guards must learn to “manage themselves better” on the floor. It was something that left Goudelock a bit bemused.
“I don’t know what that means. I asked him (Simone Pianigiani) about it because I didn’t appreciate that. I played maybe around 10 minutes in that game so I didn’t really understand what it was about. He told me he didn’t say that. I read the post-game interview and I said something. He said he didn’t say it.”
Reinforcements from the NBA arrived in the Forum on January 1st, when Goudelock and his teammates welcomed former New York Knick Mindaugas Kuzminskas in their company. Is he someone who might help navigate Olimpia Milano towards a potential turnaround?
“I hope so. But at this point, I don’t think it’s that much about plugging in new players. We got the players. Something has to change. We’ll see.”