By Alex Molina / amolina@eurohoops.net
FC Barcelona secured one of their most impressive victories of the season on Thursday night, overcoming Panathinaikos in Athens in a thrilling encounter. Following the game, Aleksander Sekulic expressed his pride in his team’s performance, highlighting their defensive effort, resilience and belief until the final moments.
“I’m proud of what we’ve achieved tonight. We played against a very good team that defends extremely well. They managed to slow us down offensively, but we also did a good job defensively. The most important thing is that we believed until the very end that we could pull off an upset here. We fought until the final moment, and this is our reward. I want us to carry this feeling into our next game at the Palau,” Sekulic said during his post-game press conference.
Sekulic also praised Barcelona’s collective effort, emphasising the importance of squad rotation and maintaining a high level of intensity throughout the game.
“Our idea is to have plenty of rotations and use as many available players as possible. We want to maintain maximum intensity throughout the entire game. That is not easy against a team like Panathinaikos, but we managed to defend well, and Justin Robinson made some big shots,” he said.
The Catalan side’s victory was sealed by Justin Robinson, who emerged as the decisive figure by hitting the game-winning three-pointer. Sekulic revealed that the team had deliberately designed the final possession for the guard.
Regarding the decisive possession, Sekulic made it clear that Robinson was always the intended option, as he had already scored 13 points during the fourth quarter before the game-winning three pointer.
“The last play was designed for him, a one-on-one situation. Considering the form he was in, we wanted him to be the one to score the final basket.”
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