"We are proud of this new step and to make it to the final of this Final Four in Paris. This semifinal game took a lot out of us, in terms of playing offense, and we based our work on defense. I thought we had good first minutes on defense, but on offense we couldn't get our rhythm. At that moment, we found Pete Mickeal and he helped keep us in the game until, little by little, we started going up. It was a dramatic few minutes there, playing point for point, defense against defense, but we were getting more comfortable before halftime. After that, in the third quarter, CSKA came out playing and reacting well. We were not as good as before on defense then. It seemed that CSKA was working on its bench and they came up with some good baskets. By the last quarter, though, we had regained control and I think were able to manage our lead well down the stretch.

"I think we had a big problem tonight despite the fact that we played defense very well, and that is that we were unable early to control the rebounding. Not having control of our defensive rebounds especially, we didn't get the confidence to run. But we knew that in a Final Four it would be difficult to run. We knew that it would be difficult and that we had to adapt to this type of game.

"It's true that Ricky Rubio played well. For me, however, I like him the same whether he is just playing solid basketball like tonight or if he's making spectacular passes. But it has to be said he was very solid in playing in his first game of this type at the Final Four.

"Since you can't choose which team you will play against in the final, I prefer not to say anything, because my words won't change anything. The team that deserves to win will be there. Both Partizan and Olympiacos deserve to be here after a great season. They have different styles, but both are great teams."