By Antonis Stroggylakis/ info@eurohoops.net
Olympiacos coach Giorgos Bartzokas commended his star player Evan Fournier for his impact on the team that stretches beyond the obvious qualities he brings to the floor.
“There are a lot of things to say about Evan,” Bartzokas said after the away win over Paris Basketball.
“Everybody can see how he plays, on every court and in every arena. He’s a fantastic player. What I want to say about him is that, mostly, he’s a great teammate, a great character and great personality. He’s the guy who unites everybody on the team. For a guy with so many years in the NBA, coming back to Europe and being the first who comes on the court and the last leaving, that’s very important.”
This was a return for Fournier to Paris for the first time after the 2024 Olympic Games when the swingman helped his national team win the silver medal. Paris had prepared a nice tribute to him during the presentation of the Reds with a highlight segment of some of his most impressive plays in the Olympics being shown on the jumbotron of Adidas Arena.
Fournier finished with 18 points as Olympiacos beat Paris to also take a bit of a vengeance for the French team’s victory at Piraeus in the first leg of the regular season.
“They kicked our ass in the first game,” the veteran player commented to EuroLeague TV. “There was no way we’d let them do that again.”
“I think they had a better game today than they had then. And we had a better game over there than we had today,” mentioned Paris coach Tiago Splitter. “Today, we couldn’t make a shot. Sometimes… basketball is ‘miss or make.’ As simple as that,” the Brazilian coach added. His team shot 9 – 37 from the perimeter, which was quite the contrast to Olympiacos‘ 11-27.
Paris was down 22 – 42 two minutes before halftime and was trailing 44 – 59 halfway through the third quarter. Splitter’s players made a comeback attempt to approach 65 – 71 but Olympiacos responded with a 2 – 11 run to remain in total control.
“I tried everything I had,” Splitter said when asked if he has any regrets about how Paris tried to stop Olympiacos. “Different matchups, switches, hedging out. Doubling at the post, not doubling at the post. You tell me what I should’ve done differently?”
“We tried different things,” Splitter previously said. “We put Mikka [Jantunen] at the ‘5’. Trying to stretch the floor a little bit.”
Splitter had appeared vexed over certain aspects of the game in the post-game flash interview “Trying to stay calm and not saying something that I shouldn’t,” he answered without going into details when asked about his first reaction after the loss to Olympiacos during the post-game flash interview.
Two days after he was officially announced as the EuroLeague MVP for January, Olympiacos forward Sasha Vezenkov produced 23 points plus six rebounds vs. Paris. He produced 17 of them by the first nine minutes to set his team to a 10-30 entrance.
“It’s a privilege for me to have players like Sasha,” Bartzokas said.