By Aris Barkas/ barkas@eurohoops.net
Since the 2002 Euroleague final four, only five teams have won Euroleague, Panathinaikos, Maccabi Tel Aviv, CSKA Moscow, Barcelona and most recently Olympiacos. Only Barcelona is coming from a really competitive league so we had to ask if that’s an issue. Domestic competition helps a team get better also in Euroleague, or it’s an added burden for the title contenders?
We send the same question to the general managers of the teams which have won the Euroleague and also to Real Madrid, one of the top contenders the last two seasons. Real’s management politely refused to answer, however every one else did and they were surprisingly honest.
We have to start with Panathinaikos, the four times Euroleague winner of the last 12 years (2002, 2007, 2009, 2011) and the Green GM Manos Papadopoulos: “A more competitive domestic league helps basketball generally in every level. On the court it helps the team improve and the players to be better. However, on the matter of winning the Euroleague, it’s a different story. Panathinaikos have won Euroleague titles when the Greek league was really competitive and also did the same when the situation in Greece changed. Don’t focus only in the final, or in the final four. You have to consider a whole season. And also you have to take into account other variables. Are you sure that if a good Euroleague team, Unicaja, comes to Greece it will beat on the road Panionios, PAOK, or Aris? Greek league has its own intricacies and difficulties, that are unknown in other leagues. There are always teams that can do you damage and one defeat can change your season. For us and also for Olympiacos there’s an extra pressure, because we are “forbidden” to lose… Maybe that’s also a factor that ultimately counts”.
The general manager of Olympiacos (bask to back champions of 2012 and 2013) Christos Stavropoulos agrees: “It’s a fact that I don’t feel it’s right to be combined with the level of domestic leagues. You have to have a good level in domestic competitions. I don’t thing that it’s better to have a big difference of competition level, that can be a problem. You have to be always vigilant, you need to have a high level league. Ok, Maccabi has lost something like just two domestic titles. But which team from Italy, where the level of Legabasket is lower let’s say than in Liga Endesa, have won the Euroleague? It’s just a matter of coaching and management of the team. The coach and his stuff know when the team should be on its peak and for which games. That’s up to the team and that shows the level of its professionalism. We had too many injuries and that’s why we got off our plan and lost our balance”.
The answer of CSKA Moscow – two times champions in 2006 and 2008 – and its vice president Natalia Furaeva is really interesting: “First, I would like to correct you. The last decade CSKA got two titles as well and in my opinion you underestimate the level of Russian clubs, despite the fact that Unics, Khimki and Lokomotiv Kuban played well in Euroleague, qualified for Top16 and competed in the playoffs. Russian teams also won several Eurocups and played in Eurocup finals. Secondly, almost every team has approximately the same number of games in Euroleague and its domestic league and that sustains a kind of balance in the level of competition. Also the difference in the level of the teams from different countries is not so significant now”.
However, she also believes that the two competitions can be viewed as two very different affairs and she welcomes some easy domestic games: “I don’t think that the pressure and difficulties in one tournament can negatively influence your play in the other tournament. In my opinion, they only add motivation and positive experience if your team aims at the highest goals. Also it is good to have not so strong opponents sometimes, to have let’s say semi-practice games. If we had only strong opponents in the domestic competition our team would have no chance to take a breather, to rest mentally and physically”.
The architect of Barcelona (winner of 2003 and 2010), technical secretary according to his title, and one brilliant basketball mind, Joan Creus, also thinks that winning the Euroleague has very little to do with the level of the domestic league, but harder domestic league games may have their price: “A Final Four win does not depend on a strong or weak domestic league. There are many factors involved. The four teams competing for the title are of high standards and anything can happen, regardless of the path taken. In general I think that playing in a strong league can take its toll in the short term – losing some specific games – due to fatigue and the effort required, but also in long term it can be beneficiary, because the players can become stronger given the difficulties and the pressure. In this case, however, a season ending injury – and it’s likely that more injuries would happen in a strong league – can become a decisive handicap”.
Last but not least, we present you the answer of Euroleague legend and now team manager of Maccabi Tel Aviv (champions of 2004 and 2005), Nikola Vujcic, who has been a champion. What he thinks? “To be in the Final Four you need a strong team. It’s much more important that having a strong league. Also it’s not so easy to play two strong games every week, it’s taking so much energy”.
So you can see that there’s no easy answer. However, we can all agree on something. For the top European clubs, winning the Euroleague, or at least getting a place in the final four, is a main priority and the domestic leagues are slowly getting a back seat, being in many cases just a nice consolation prize.