By Antonis Stroggylakis / info@eurohoops.net
ABU DHABI (United Arab Emirates) – Panathinaikos center Mathias Lessort faces quite the challenge ahead of the 2025 Final Four.
One hand, there’s the burning, undisputable desire he has inside him to gear up and help his teammates in their efforts to win the back-to-back championship title.
On the other, there’s the fact that he’s been nursing a broken fibula he suffered back in December and the uncertainty he feels on whether he’ll be able to provide a positive impact on the floor.
“We’ll see tomorrow, but the guys were fighting without me for five months,” Lessort told Eurohoops. “It’s also their moment, they earned their tickets here. I’m just here to help the team.
“I really respect what my teammates did. I helped them for half of the season, but for the other half and the playoffs they did it without me. I don’t want to come in and f-k up everything they built,” Lessort then added in his usual candid fashion. “We were here last year with me, but they got here this year without me.”
I’m just here to trying to help them and whatever I can do to contribute to help my team and my organization.
“I’ve been working really hard for five months to come back,” Lessort previously mentioned. “I’ve been in the gym for five-six hours a day every day, seven days a week. I really worked hard. It’s a teamwork, everybody contributed. Even people around me, who’d decided to be here.”
They see what I can do and what I can bring to the team. We’ll see tomorrow how he [Coach Ergin Ataman] decides to use me, how many minutes, if he does use me.
They’re my brothers, we are family. This goes beyond what they say in front of the camera. I know how they feel, and they know how I feel about them. I’m just happy to be back with the guys, my brothers on the court.