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CSKA MOSCOW
Head Coach
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MESSINA, ETTORE
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"I feel so happy you know. Today my son got better, you’ll excuse me if I get a bit emotional, and we won the Final against a great Maccabi, champion of the 2004 and 2005 Euroleague. It had been 36 years since our club CSKA had not won this title. I am sure that Alexander Gomelsky would be proud of what we accomplished tonight. We played smart and that led us to the title against a great Maccabi."
"The team played excellent. The key to victory was in their minds. It's different to compare [this title with the previous ones]. In 1998 when we won in Barcelona, it was the first ever European championship for Bologna, so you understand how special that was. This is special because it is my first year outside my country. Second, because no one gave us a chance after David Andersen's injury."
"I believe a lot in tradition. To be the second coach after Aleksandar Gomelsky to win the Euroleague is an incredible honor. You have no idea what Gomelsky means to Russian basketball, European and even world basketball. This is something I can tell my son about in five or 10 years. Savrasenko came from nowhere to be a factor."
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CSKA MOSCOW
Guard
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PAPALOUKAS, THEODOROS
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"We played with our heart and our soul tonight. I have felt like this twice in one year this is amazing. I had lost three Final Fours befote this, but I won't remember them . We did it and we deserved it. We placed with head and heart. With heart and soul and we are the champions."
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CSKA MOSCOW
Guard
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HOLDEN, J.R.
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"Man, I can't even explain what it's like, to be here for the fourth time and finally get to a final. I could not sleep. I could not eat. But in the huddle, we just kept telling each other that 'We believe'. Nobody believed in us. Against Barcelona, we were down and came back. Maccabi was the team that always blew everyone out in the final. But if you play hard, you win. I shot terrible tonight. Trajan had a normal game. But everybody played hard and played together. That's why we're a team."
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CSKA MOSCOW
Guard
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LANGDON, TRAJAN
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"For 40 minutes, we believed, just like the whole season we believed. All year long, we fought back. We started bad, we lost our best player, but we fought back. All we ever talked about was believing in ourselves. No one else did, so we had to. To go down 7-0 against that team come back to take control, you have to believe. They came back and we took control again. We believe. That's all I can say."
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CSKA MOSCOW
Center
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VAN DEN SPIEGEL, TOMAS
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"It’s incredible. This is great because four months ago I was in a difficult situation, I worked very hard and I have to thank CSKA for the opportunity that they gave me. I still can’t realice what we accomplished. We knew defense was the key, we had to keep Maccabi in a low scoring game, so it was a completely different game from what they are used to. We made them think and that made the difference."
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CSKA MOSCOW
NotSet
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VANTERPOOL, DAVID
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"We made a couple threes in the end and that made the difference down the stretch. We fought really hard this season all year long. We played really good defense to try to hold Macacbi’s scoring. What made the difference tonight, is that we played our style of basketball and we won. I want to dedicate this title to all CSKA fans we will all party Moscow style. I also want to dedicate this to Alexander Gomelsky, I didn’t have the chance to meet him or to play when he was on the organization, but this is a great tribute to him and I’m sure he’s looking down from Heaven and smiling as happy as we are."
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MACCABI ELITE TEL AVIV
Head Coach
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GERSHON, PINI
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"CSKA has a great coach. They played excellent. I said before the Final Four that it's not easy to play the same game at the same level twice in 48 hours. We played a great game on Friday, but used our starters for a lot of minutes and it's not easy to beat a good team without help from the bench. Even though we held them to 73 points – about their average – they held us well below our average and for that they deserve it. They took the title from the champs... It was a great game. We made too many mistakes. You can't turn the ball over 20 times and make 8 assists – half our average – and win in a final. They have great players, a great coach. They deserve it. I congratulate them. I hope that Maccabi will respect my wishes not to coach for the next two or three years. I've made this decision before and I want to go rest. Six years at Maccabi is like 18 years somewhere else. Maccabi needs to start with a new coach for a few years and I'm not strong enough to coach Maccabi for a few more years."
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MACCABI ELITE TEL AVIV
Guard
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SHARP, DERRICK
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"Defense was their key, we turned the ball over and took bad shots. That’s our fault and they took advantage of that. The crowd cannot win it for us. We still have to play basketball and play to win and we didn’t do that tonight. On a game like this, the loose balls, the rebounds, and the turnovers count a lot. They made the shots down the stretch."
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MACCABI ELITE TEL AVIV
Guard
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BURSTEIN, TAL
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"We couldn't get into our game on offense. It was a battle between game styles, and they won it, and they play better in their style so they won. I don't think it's an end of an era. Certainly not. We are professionals, and we'll have to recover from it and continue to play in the league. We made too many turnovers and too few assists. We scored only 69 points, and this is one of the fewest points we scored. You can't win every season, this is life."
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MACCABI ELITE TEL AVIV
Guard
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PARKER, ANTHONY
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"I just give CSKA all the credit. They played really well. They slowed us down, made every shot tough for us and they played great down the stretch. The last two minutes were the key. We had two turnovers when we needed to get good shots, but again we couldn't get it done and they did. They deserve it. It's a dissapointment to come up one game short like this. Everyone wants to win it all when you get to this point. We just couldn't get into a rhythm on offense. Defensivly we played good, but not on offense. We made too many turnovers. They were in a zone and played great. It just wasn't our game. I want to thank to everybody who played great. They had a great game, they made plays. When we came back they scored some shots, I don't know if it was luck or they were just good, but it doesn't matter now. I want to thank to all the fans who came here to support us."
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MACCABI ELITE TEL AVIV
Forward
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ARNOLD, JAMIE
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"It's embarrassing... [CSKA] did a great job and we need to take our hats off to them, but it's not a good feeling. We did all we could do. I don't know what was missing. They worked hard and you have to give them credits. They made a great job. They forced us a game we are not used to play, and we didn't do the things we usually do."
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