At Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv they’re celebrating the huge victory over Caja Laboral and the fabulous accomplishment of qualifying for the Final Four in Barcelona.
By Amy Samin
“It’s a lot of fun, and I’m happy people are enjoying themselves,” said Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv’s head coach David Blatt after his team’s victory. “At the beginning of the year, people didn’t really believe, and we ourselves didn’t really know how far we would go. All year long we’ve been among the best teams in Europe, and we’ve proven that in this series.”
Blatt went on, “All of the credit goes to the players. Jeremy was great, and everyone who played made a difference. We’ll need to compensate for Doron Perkin’s absence in Barcelona.” When asked about Guy Pnini, the coach responded, “There’s no one like Pnini in the big games. Before every game I have to convince him that this one is the biggest of the season. Pargo took on a lot of responsibility. He’s a great player.”
When asked to compare this season with those of the early 2000s, Blatt replied, “It’s completely different from what I achieved with Pini [Gershon, then head coach of Maccabi] because this is a different and almost completely new team. We’ve done things well and with a lot of enjoyment. We have a group of guys here that are capable of doing wonderful things, things that are not being done by any other team in Europe.”
Currently, the date of the Final for the Euroleague championship is set for the eve of Israel’s Remembrance Day for Fallen Soldiers. When asked about that, Blatt told the reporters, “If we reach the Final, we won’t play at the hour currently set for the game. We need to see if they’ll be willing to change it.” And there are some regrets: “I’m sorry that we didn’t add another guard, because right now we could use one. No matter what, we have a very high-quality team.” And as for him, personally? “After all I’ve achieved in the last 7 years, I don’t need to prove anything.”
The person who seemed to be on Cloud 9, as if he’d reached the Final Four for the very first time, was club chairman Shimon Mizrahi, who said with tears of joy in his eyes, “I’m very excited. It’s an enormous achievement, to reach the Final Four, without the home court advantage and without Perkins. We’re there, and Olympiacos and Barcelona are both out.” Regarding the issue of whether or not Maccabi will play on Remembrance Day, Mizrahi replied, “Give us a couple of days and all will be well. The subject will be discussed.”
“I believed from the first time I saw the team. We’ve got two more games, and if we keep playing like this we’ll be European champions,” said Jeremy Pargo. “It was a team effort with a lot of great defense. I can’t promise anything. We’ll try and do everything we can to win.”
The guard continued, “We really wanted to win, and one thing we really didn’t want was to go back to Spain [to play the fifth game of the series in Vitoria]. We need to keep improving as a team. It’s not just my team, it’s Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv. It’ll be tough without Doron but we’ve got a lot of players who’ll step up do all they can to fill Doron’s shoes, even though they’re big ones.”
“At the start of the season we didn’t believe we’d get to this situation, but if we’re already in the Final Four then we want to go all the way,” said Guy Pnini, who scored a career-high 22 points. “I’ve never been in a Final Four, so this is a dream come true. I would ask that everyone who can, please come to support us in Barcelona. With our fans, we won’t lose there.”
“It’s an amazing victory, and we’ve accomplished our goals. I’ve got nothing else to say. We’re going to Barcelona, baby!” said an exuberant Sofoklis Schortsanitis. “I’ve believed in this team from the beginning. It was a team effort, and we had a great game. We’ve got a good team, and each of us can pick up the tempo when it’s needed. The goal is to go all the way. Once you’ve made the Final Four, the only way to go is up.”
“Hendrix was the key to the victory tonight,” Sofo continued. “He closed off all the lanes to the basket. We have a lot of depth on our team, and that was one of the main things that got us to where we are now.”
“We had a great game,” said Lior Eliyahu. “Aside from the fact that we need our fans in Barcelona, I advise people to come and travel there, because it’s an amazing place. We won this game without Perkins, and I hope we can keep executing without him. Pargo outdid himself. We’ll have to keep working even harder to make up for his [Perkins’] absence.”
“After I won the ULEB Cup with Rytas Vilna, it’d be nice to have a second cup,” said Chuck Eidson, with his usual flair for the understatement. “I heard that Doron Perkins is coming, and I hope that’s true. If he doesn’t, he’s going to need a good excuse. It’s going to be an interesting Final Four.”
“I think that the greatness of this team is that they know how to step up the intensity when one of the key players is injured and can’t play,” said assistant coach Guy Goodes, discussing the absence of Doron Perkins due to a knee injury. “Our team is strong enough, and there are players who will take up the slack. We talked about that, whether the players realized they’d need to give 20 – 30% more. Our hearts were with Doron, and this victory is also for him.”
“It doesn’t matter who we’ll face in the Final Four. I also said when we qualified for the Top 16 that we’d take whoever we got,” Goodes added. “For us, every opponent is the same. I think we deserve to be in the Final Four, and if there’s justice in basketball, it will out. In two games anything can happen, and we can go all the way.”
“I really hope they’ll change the date of the Final. I think they know in the Euroleague that a lot of our fans come to the Final Four and I think there’s a good chance, but I leave that job to Shimon [Mizrahi],” Goodes added. “They’ve known so far to take it into consideration, so there’s no reason not to.” When asked about Guy Pnini, the assistant coach remarked, “Pnini was incredible. He knew he would need to do what he did, he was the X Factor. He guarded well on defense and played like Guy knows how to do.”
“It’s a lot of fun, it feels like it did in 2004,” said David Federman, one of the owners of Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv. “To be honest, I didn’t believe we’d get to the Final Four, because we built a new team this year. I know that in the Euroleague they are willing to change the date of the Final, but there are things that are up to the media. We’ll know in the next few days.”
“Everything I do is on a volunteer basis, just like all the rest of the management, and one of our goals is to bring the club to great achievements,” noted Shimon Mizrahi. “We are in constant contact regarding the issue of changing the date of the Final, and when there is something to announce, we’ll make an announcement. We’re going to play in the semi-final, and God willing, we’ll see what happens after that.”
“I wanted to do my best in the minutes I had, and it was a great game” said Richard Hendrix. “Together, we make this team special. It’d be nice if we had the support [in Barcelona] that we had here tonight. The fans helped us get the win, and it’d be nice if they came to Barcelona. Doron’s a good player and he did great things for us, and I think it’s the character of this team to take up the slack, and tonight we picked up the tempo.”
David Blu said, “I was happy to contribute, being in the Final Four is a great opportunity and I’m just happy. We really missed having Perkins in the locker room and on the court, and I hope we’ll see him soon. We’re going to keep up the hard work. Right now, we’re one of the four best teams in Europe, but we still have something to prove.”
