Jasikevicius on Trinchieri: 'For sure, he knows more about wines and possibly basketball than me' / News - Basketnews.com

Credit: Pedro Salado/Quality Sport Images/Getty Images Credit Pedro Salado/Quality Sport Images/Getty Images

FC Barcelona won a crucial Game 5 against FC Bayern Munich and secured a place in EuroLeague's Final Four in Belgrade.

Player of the Game EFF 30 Nicolas Laprovittola Points 26 Accuracy 7-12 Rebounds 2 Assists 3

Just after the final buzzer sounded in Palau Blaugrana, Sarunas Jasikevicius and Andrea Trinchieri spent good 20 seconds hugging each other after an impressive quarterfinal series.

Many expected Barcelona to breeze past injury-riddled Bayern, but despite all their problems, Trinchieri managed to drag this series up until Game 5, in which the German team had a 37-31 lead at halftime.

As expected, Jasikevicius showed great sportsmanship after the game praising his Italian colleague.

"Congrats to coach Trinchieri," Jasikevicius said after the game. "It's good that I have a good relationship with him. For sure, he knows more about wines than me. Possibly, he knows more about basketball than me. I’m just happy with this competition. I think it made me a better coach."

"We shortened the rotation [in the second half]. We will talk about all the situations we had in the last 48 hours with our team," Jasikevicius continued. It was not looking very good for us. We shortened the rotation a lot. It was very good that we managed our foul trouble, and it was good that at the end of the first half, we were pretty close."

The Lithuanian head coach also emphasized that making the Final Four is not an easy feat, even despite favorable circumstances.

"Everybody who's played in the EuroLeague knows how difficult it is to get to the Final Four. We made it.

Now it’s time a little bit to relax and worry about our stuff in the ACB, worry about improving our game obviously, and hopefully, we will come to Belgrade in top shape," Jasikevicius concluded.

FC Barcelona / Schedule

FC Bayern Munich FC Barcelona66-75 FC Bayern Munich FC Barcelona59-52 FC Barcelona FC Bayern Munich81-72

Likewise, Trinchieri started his post-game comment by congratulating the opponent.

"I have two thoughts. First, I want to congratulate Saras and Barca. They put together a great second half," the Italian noted. "They deserved to win this game, they were better. The second thought goes to my players who, in my opinion, played an unbelievable series. I am very proud of them."

"We can talk for hours about this mistake or that, but tonight we put together three unbelievable quarters playing above our limit and playing as hard as we can. The third quarter cost us the game. We tried to attack the rim, but we never went to the line.

The other factor was Laprovittola, who put together an unbelievable performance tonight. That’s it. I don’t feel depressed. I don’t feel overwhelmed by the situation. I have never been more proud of players and my team. There is also another team on the court, and in the third quarter, Barca was a championship team, and this is the reason they won the game," concluded Trinchieri.

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