By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Baskonia trailed even by 27 points en route to a home loss to AS Monaco, the fourth straight defeat for the team in the EuroLeague. And coach Pablo Laso was quite displeased with how his squad performed.
How much? Laso kept his players in the locker room for more than one hour after the end of the game. He had yet to appear in the press conference room, 60 minutes after Monaco coach Sasa Obradovic finished with his own comments.
Laso was so frustrated with the way Baskonia played in the first 20 minutes that he didn’t even participate in the customary halftime flash interview for EuroLeague TV. The Basque side was down 24 – 47 at the break after starting the game trailing 5 – 22 (!) at the end of the first quarter.
“Let’s put it this way: After the first half it’s very difficult to analyze anything today,” Laso commented right after the final buzzer. “We were not here in the first half. We fought back in the second half. That’s the only thing I have to say.”
Baskonia trimmed the halftime deficit to five, 55 – 60, near the end of the third period but Monaco pulled away again to increase its lead and stay out of reach.
“Congratulations to Monaco. We didn’t have enough energy at the start of the match,” Laso later said in the opening statement during the presser. “That was a big difference. Energy wasn’t the same. The difference was too much for us. The third quarter reaction was good.”