By Johnny Askounis/ info@eurohoops.net
A long-awaited comeback from injury materialized in the Orlando bubble and produced several solid outings, but the passing of his grandmother almost sidelined Jusuf Nurkic from the Western Conference play-in game that took place on Saturday. The Bosnian center admitted after the end of the match that he contemplated sitting out.
“I didn’t want to play. I think she made me play, I guess,” he mentioned keeping his emotions for himself, “Personally, I thought I am not going to play. She would have wanted me to play.”
Nurkic, 25, returned to action and went through the seeding games knowing that his grandmother in Bosnia contracted coronavirus and is in a coma. Prior to the play-in game versus the Memphis Grizzlies, he was struck by the terrible news.
“I am glad we won and we are in the playoffs that we came for,” he pointed out after his 22 points, 21 rebounds, six assists, two blocks, and two steals over 41 minutes.
The claimed eighth seed bumps the Blazers into a best-of-seven series against the Los Angeles Lakers in the first round of the playoffs scheduled to begin on Monday.
“I don’t care about the Lakers, I care about my team,” he replied to a question on the next challenge for his side, “We are a team. We just care about ourselves. They are a great team but they got to earn it.”
Strong displays in the NBA bubble so far got him up to 17.6 points, 10.3 rebounds, 4.9 assists, 2.0 blocks, and 1.4 steals per contest.