CSKA vs. Partizan Serbia: 90-88 OT
Evgeny Pashutin, CSKA head coach:
"First of all, I will would like to thank my team and CSKA for this win tonight. It is a big, big holiday in Russia today - May 9, Memorial Day and all Russian people are now on the street celebrating. A lot of people died, more than 40 million. For us, it is the most important celebration. Our win today was also for the country and those that fought many years ago. I am proud of the heart we put on the court. We fought until the end and whatever happens, happens, but we won the game. Partizan is a great basketball organization and a very well-coached team. They deserved to be here and were not lucky. With just six second left in the semifinals, they were almost in the final - but this is basketball. Partizan deserved to be in the Final Four and it all depended if a shot went in or not. It has great tradition and organization, the Serbian school is a powerhouse in basketball, with a lot of high-level coaches. Dusko Vujosevic did a great job this year - if we compare from the last two season, players like Velickovic or Pekovic left but Partizan prepared well and used good young players. You see former Partizan players all around Europe. It is the same this year. Bo McCalebb, Aleks Maric or Lawrence Roberts are big, big surprises this year. I think Partizan played smart and made it a close game. They played the zone really well, it is not easy to attack. They have size, are huge, control the rebounds and don't allow the other team to run and play fast. We made the difference because we were able to attack in half court game with Langdon, Holden or Khryapa, who did great tonight. Trajan is the best shooter in Europe in the last few years, with great hands. If you allow him to shoot, nobody can stop him. We set high-quality screens and prepared position for him. We played less pick-and-roll because Partizan is great at denying it. You are not able to get any advantage, so we set more screens for Holden and Langdon, that showed that they belong to the highest level. I hope that Trajan can continue in the club for many, many years."
