By Eurohoops team / info@eurohoops.net
Crvena Zvezda’s season in the EuroLeague has come to an end with a thrilling overtime ending in Munich, with Bayern advancing to the second game of the Play-Ins against Real Madrid.
In the sad defeat for the Serbian red-and-white side, Filip Petrusev had a stellar losing effort of 30 points, 5 rebounds, and 4 assists, shooting 12/14 from the field.
Speaking to Meridian Sport in the post-game, he analyzed his team’s bitter defeat. “It was a tough game, a real battle, a playoff-type match. We kept trading the lead, exploiting every mismatch. In the end, we came back in the fourth quarter,” he commented.
“I don’t want to say anything that could get me fined, but that decision… Let them review it themselves, I won’t say anything more. Let them see what they did. We gave it our all, we had plenty of chances this year, and there’s a sense of regret because we could have achieved more. We’ll learn from this and come back stronger,” Petrusev also touched on the ultimate shenanigans.
“They scored two points from that situation; it definitely would’ve been different if we had gotten the ball. We would’ve had a full possession. We ran out of energy in overtime, but we gave everything we had. Every free throw counts, especially in a finish like this: those details make a difference in matchups like these, and that surely affected the loss.”
Ultimately, Filip Petrusev believes Crvena Zvezda must regret how they missed out on making it to the EuroLeague Playoffs. “We lost a lot of close games by a single possession, games we could’ve won. If we had taken just one or two of those, we’d be in the playoffs, where I believe we belonged”, he said.
He also affirmed he would like to return to Belgrade in 25-26. “We have to learn from this, and hopefully a lot of the players will stay together and carry it into next season. I hope I’ll be here. Why not?”.
Moving on loan from Olympiacos to his former team once the season had already started, he made his debut in the 2024-25 EuroLeague campaign against Zalgiris Kaunas in Round 6. Overall, he has averaged 14.1 points, 4.9 rebounds, and 1.7 assists per game with Crvena Zvezda.
PHOTO CREDIT: Turkish Airlines EuroLeague