By Aris Barkas/ barkas@eurohoops.net
Last season, Sasha Vujacic returned to Europe in the middle of the NBA lock out and even without winning any title with Anadolu Efes, he decided to stay one more year in Turkey. Why? Well, the two times NBA champion with the Lakers feels that he still has a job to do and he believes this season Efes has an ever better chance to win: “I think we have a good team, we added some good pieces. If you look to our roster you will see players who know how to play basketball and we are trying to find the best way to take to it to the next level”.
Τhe fact that last season ended without any title is a big motivation for him: “That left us with a sour taste. We were disappointed in Euroleague and also in the Turkish championship, so that was a bad end. This year we have unfinished business, so hopefully we just have to find a way to play basketball and have fun”.
Maybe the change of Euroleague’s competition format, with the expanded Top16 schedule which makes the regular season more of a warm up period, like in the NBA, will help him adapt better: “It should be fun, but right now it’s, in a way, the last stages of a building process. The team has to play its best basketball and have the momentum in the end of the season. We are still searching each other from game to game and sometimes we… forget to play basketball, but it’s definitely much better for us to play in a NBA like system”.
Speaking about NBA, it was odd, but last Thursday at Piraeus three former teammates and NBA champions with the Lakers met again on the court. Josh Powell was playing for Olympiacos, Vujacic and Jordan Farmar are the stars of Anadolu Efes. Did the Slovenian guard expected something like that when he decided to return to Europe? “No. Actually, Jordan and I, we can’t get away from each other, you know, we went from the Lakers to Nets together, but I will never said that Josh would end up with Olympiacos. It’s a very respected team and they won last year. We are phoning each other and we are having fun. I wish him all the best and I think that it’s really a funny story”.
It will be interesting to see them all again οn the same court in the play offs, are even in Euroleague’s Final Four, as Vujacic wishes: “Hopefully. We will see. The truth is that both sides are successful, we are doing the best we can. Josh is a champion as well, he works hard and he is going to give his best in order to help Olympiacos”.