I’m not going to lie. I almost jinxed the championship game.

We were up five and there was maybe 30 seconds left. Vasa was at the line for two and I assumed he was going to make them both. So before he shot his first free throw, I went up to Kruno and I said, “Dang, bro, we actually did it. I can’t believe it.”

Then Vasa missed the first free throw. Kruno was like, “Oh my God, bro. Don’t curse us now. Just wait these 30 seconds. Wait these 30 seconds, and then we’ll celebrate.”

Thirty seconds later, we had held on and won.

I’ve spent a lot of time over the last month reflecting on that.

We won. We did it.

When the game was over, I just kept putting my hands over my face and I was just, like, speechless. I didn’t know what to feel. I didn’t really know how to explain my emotions at the moment because there was so much stuff to get there.

Sometimes I just go on the internet, or social media, or YouTube and watch the videos, the celebration, because in a way, I feel like I missed it. It was an extremely happy moment, don’t get me wrong, but as it happened it kind of didn’t feel real.

It didn’t really hit until these last few weeks.

I’m a EuroLeague champion. That’s really special. There are guys over here who have been here for 15 years and never won one single EuroLeague Championship. So for me to do it in three seasons (and one season didn’t have a chance), it feels amazing. It also solidified my status as one of the better players that’s come through and played here, so that’s definitely a great feeling.

There were so many things that happened. So many. You start with losing in the final two years ago, and then not being able to finish the season last year when we were the favorites to win the Championship. Then this year, to start the season the way we did, have all the injury issues that we did. Halfway through the season we had a losing record. We were eight and nine. People were questioning if we were even going to make the playoffs.

To make the playoffs, to go up 2-0 against Madrid, to lose two in a row in Madrid, to come back home and have that wild Game 5—and then going to Cologne and finally finishing the business that we had been chasing for so long—it showed the true test of the character we had on this team.

We were able to fight through all the adversity. We never let our spirits get too down based on all the stuff that we’d been through during the season, injuries and all that. We really rose to the occasion in the biggest moments, on the biggest stages, and came out a champion. It was a huge testament to the characters that we have on this team.

When it actually happened, you couldn’t really believe it.

It was just like, oh my God. We actually did it. We’re really here.

We had to go through the team that beat us in the final two years ago, CSKA Moscow. We did that.

Then we had to go through Barcelona, the team that was first in the standings, had the biggest budget in the league, brought in all these new players, brought in Pau Gasol, who is a legend, brought in the most highly sought after coach and had one of the frontrunners for the MVP.

It just felt like it was supposed to happen the way it happened.

Like it was written in stone, somewhere, some place.

It was destiny.

ONE DAY IN DECEMBER

In the last blog entry, I mentioned how the season had been kind of a roller coaster. Now, looking back on the season as a whole, there are a couple moments that really stick out to me. The biggest one was back in December.

We had lost three games in a row. Some bad losses. We got blown out a couple times in December and we had some close games that we lost which we probably should have won. So we had that stretch of games and then our next one was at home against Barcelona, who was on top of the EuroLeague and everybody was picking them as the favorite to win the league.

They were coming to Sinan Erdem and a loss to them might have buried us.

That was the game that kind of pushed us forward, back to the place that we needed to be in order to get back to the Final Four and have another chance to win a championship.

We had a team meeting and we all laid it out there. We all spoke about what we felt was going on with the team: good things, bad things. What we needed to do more of. What we needed to do less of. And we kind of just aired it all out. It was productive.

Afterward, we all went into that game, knowing that Barcelona were one of the better teams in the league, and wanted to make a statement. And I think that was kind of where our season turned around. We won that game. We were actually up pretty big towards the end but Barcelona made a run at the end to make it close. But we won that game, and I think that kind of helped our confidence going in the right direction.

From there on out, we got on a roll. We started winning a bunch of games. We started blowing people out. We only lost a handful of games the rest of the way. And I think that was the game or the moment that kind of pushed us forward, to get back to the place that we needed to be in order to get back to the Final Four and have another chance to win a championship.

LEARNING AS A LEADER

It was a difficult year. There’s so many different challenges you face in a season like this that you didn’t necessarily face before.

Usually, there’s a lot more going on outside of the team. Everybody is different, but for a lot of us, when we have a bad game or a bad set of games, or something is going on at home, or stuff like that, there are certain escapes you enjoy. You can go out and have dinner with teammates. You can go out and enjoy a movie. You can go out on a boat. There’s many different things you can do in Istanbul to kind of take your mind away from basketball.

Instead, this year, there wasn’t a whole lot to do but think about basketball.

In Turkey, for a large part of the year, it’s been a complete lockdown. There’s been no restaurants. No trips to the mall. No movie theaters. No parks. Nothing that you can do to kind of take your mind off basketball.

That was a challenge for all of us. We had to adjust, and I think personally, I had to step into a more vocal leadership role with my teammates.

The biggest thing I learned this season about being a leader is how much weight my voice carries with the team, and how to be a voice of reason.

Early on in the year, I wasn’t with the team. I was in Miami training, trying to get back healthy, and we didn’t start the season the way we wanted to. We were 1-3. Players, coaches and staff were all calling me about what was happening on the court. I probably heard from 90 percent of the team. That kind of showed me how much the team looks to me.

Now, I pride myself on being a guy that other guys can come and talk to if things aren’t going the way they want them to go. I was able to talk to teammates who are going through negative spots or down moments, and kind of be a release for them. I learned to look for signs that guys are under a lot of pressure or have built up some negative energy, and tried to talk to those guys and be there for them at any moment.

That’s the biggest area that I grew into as a leader this season: being that guy that when things aren’t going well, you can talk to me. I’m going to instill confidence in you and make you feel better about the situation, and not make you feel as though things are as bad as everybody else may say they are.

For me, it’s about being more vocal, and that’s a challenge for me, because I am a lead-by-example type by nature. I was a guy who you looked at on the court, and you saw that I was never too high, never too low. You could look at me and see that I was confident, and hopefully, that confidence kind of rubbed off on everybody around the team.

That’s another way I’ve grown as a leader: voicing what I see out there on the court. It’s all aimed at having as much success on the court as we can as a team.

But I embraced using my voice a little more this season, and being a calming factor out there on the court, being able to pick my teammates up in bad situations. Sometimes, I would just see guys with their heads down, and I would go and talk to them and try to make them feel better, pick their heads up. I’d stay after practice if guys were just getting extra shots up or getting treatment. It’s a matter of trying to relay confidence and give my teammates the ability to relax, and be who they are, and know that regardless of what goes on, we’re going to be here for you and still have all the confidence in you that you deserve to have.

It’s helped me, too, because at times this season, I wasn’t able to have my best games on the court. We go out there every night, and everybody knows that I’m one of the best scorers in the league. So the main focus of the other team is to stop me from scoring.

We have a lot of guys who can score, but if I get going and I score at a high level, you’re really going to be in for a long night. So a lot of the times teams have used different defenses against me, switching on me, sending two, sometimes three defenders just to make sure that I don’t get going offensively. In those moments, I would tell my teammates, “You have to be aggressive. You have to take the shots. You have to create because if I’m going to have so much attention on me, that means you have less on you. And you should have more opportunities and be in a good position to be successful.”

That’s another way I’ve grown as a leader: voicing what I see out there on the court, calling certain plays, using different counters that I see on the fly, speaking with my teammates during free throws and stuff like that. It’s all aimed at having as much success on the court as we can as a team.

In Game 4 of the Madrid series, they came out and blasted us, and we were down 17-0 at the start of the game. I remember walking over to the bench and telling everybody to relax. “Everybody calm down,” I said. “We’re a great team. We’re in a bad situation right now, but we have more than enough ability to come back from this, and turn things around.”

We weren’t able to do it in that game, but we didn’t let it take us out of the series, and in Game 5, we were able to dig deep, show what we are all really about, and rally.

It’s not ever been about me. I’m not a me-first guy. It doesn’t matter if I have 20 points, or if I have five points. It doesn’t really matter to me as long as we win.

A TRUE TEAM

We had a lot of guys step up over the course of this run and really make their presence felt.

Vasilije Micić was great for us all season, obviously. He won MVP of the regular season and MVP of the Final Four for a reason. He was the best player in the league this year. He is just such a talented player, a guy who can pass, shoot, dribble, create, and that definitely takes the pressure off of me and I think I take the pressure off of him at the same time. We can ride him and he can carry us to victory at times, and then at times I can carry us to victory. And if we both have it going at the same time there are few teams in Europe that actually have a chance to beat us.

So being able to have a backcourt partner of that level and that skill set, of that mentality and character definitely takes the pressure off and makes it much easier to just go out there and play.

I know if I’m not playing well or if I don’t have a rhythm, if I’m not at the top level that I can be at, I have a partner or I have a teammate that’s always gonna be there. And if I don’t have it going he can pick me up, and if he doesn’t have it going I can pick him up, and we can definitely just support each other through the games in whatever situations we’re going through. So it definitely makes it much easier.

And for him to win the MVP this year after I was the assumed MVP last year just shows how special that backcourt is. I haven’t been in Europe for that long, so I don’t know the extensive history of backcourts that have played over here. But from what I do know, I think that we’re maybe one of the best, if not the best backcourt that has been put together in recent EuroLeague history.

Another guy that really stepped up this year was Sertaç Şanlı. He’s the guy I would say improved the most over the last few seasons. He hadn’t played many minutes over the previous few years that I’ve been here, but he had somewhat of a breakout this year.

Last year, Bryant Dunston began the year as our starting center, but then he had an unfortunate injury that forced him to miss a lot of time. And they were talking about, “Should we sign a player? Should we sign another big man, and should we spend some money to bring in a guy to replace Bryant?” And we had Sertaç all along, and Sertaç kinda put all those thoughts to the back burner because he played amazing. He stepped up, he played well.

This season Tibor Pleiss and Bryant started the season as our main centers, and then Bryant went out with an eye injury again this season, and then Tibor went out with a foot injury, so Sertaç stepped up again. But I think halfway through this season he became a starting center for the rest of the year and he had an unbelievable season. When we were struggling, we switched things up a bit, and he gave us a look that really helped us get rolling. He spaces the floor as a big man, but he also protects the rim in a great way, which gives us a different option than what we typically had been using on the court over the last three years.

So in terms of individual performance, I think Sertaç really stepped up to the plate and showed that he’s one of the best centers in the entire EuroLeague.

Bryant Dunston is our best defensive player, and he’s always a fighter. He plays great in the pick and roll, blocks shots, is very active and has great hands. When we have him and Chris Singleton out there, we have a really strong frontcourt defense, maybe one of the strongest in the league.

Chris stepped up when we needed him on offense, too. Without Chris, there’s no way we win that Game 5 against Real Madrid. We really needed somebody on the inside to have a big game and counter that zone defense. Chris was the one who answered the bell.

One key guy that really changed the game for us in two of the most important games of the season was Tibor Pleiss. He’s definitely an unsung hero who doesn’t get the amount of praise and respect that he deserves.

Our big guys aren’t usually the focal point of our offense, it’s usually me, Vasa, Kruno, Roddy. Most of the time, that’s the focal point of our offense. We use pick and rolls in isolation, and stuff like that to get those baskets.

But in Game 5 against Madrid, we went to Chris early in the game in the middle of the zone, and he just punished anybody that was guarding him. He punished their big guys. He punished their guards. So all credit to him for stepping up in the biggest moment of the season, while the pressure was on, and having his best game as a member of our team.

I really respected the way that he stayed focused and committed. To pull us through with 26 and 8—in Game 5 in the EuroLeague playoffs—is a humongous achievement for him.

I’m glad that I was a part of it and got to see him really shine in that moment.

Roddy Beaubois played really well in the semi-final game. He is one of those guys who is always going to push the envelope. There are going to be moments where Roddy can carry us offensively for quarters, or a full game. He’s one of the firestarters for us.

One key guy that really changed the game for us in two of the most important games of the season was Tibor Pleiss. In Game 5 of the playoffs against Madrid at home, he hadn’t played all series long, but Coach decided to put Tibor in the game in the fourth quarter. He came in and hit a huge three, had a huge block, and really created that distance that we needed.

Then in the final, he did the same exact thing. We weren’t really playing that well. Coach put Tibor in early in the game. Tibor came and then hit a huge corner shot, then he hit a huge three and it really gave us some confidence, gave us a little boost, and those are the unspoken things. If you look at the stats sheet, he only probably played something like 6-7 minutes, but those minutes that he gave us were huge.

For him to stay ready and be able to come in and contribute the way he did without having much rhythm, without having much game time over the last few months of the season, was really huge. He’s definitely an unsung hero who doesn’t get the amount of praise and respect that he deserves.

The same goes for Krunoslav Simon. Kruno has had some key moments, made key shots. The shot in Game 5 against Real Madrid is one we will always remember, and one that he will never forget. That was just a huge, huge moment.

Kruno had been struggling in the series. He’s typically a guy who scores in double figures, has four or five rebounds, four or five assists per game, but like many of us, he had been battling with what Madrid had been doing to us defensively. They played a matchup zone, had their defense switching, and it kind of took a lot of us out of our games.

It was impacting Kruno especially in those first four games. But he came out really aggressive in Game 5, and we really needed him in that game. He’s one of our key guys, one of our veterans, an experienced player who has been there before. We needed him to step up, and he really did.

Everybody loves Kruno on the team: on the court, off the court. He’s always been a steady guy in the locker room. He’s universally respected for everything that he does, especially being the age that he is now. For him to hit that shot the way he did in that moment, with all the pressure that has been on this team all season, was huge for him, huge for us. It couldn’t have happened to a better guy.

But that’s the thing about this team. Everybody has really done their part. Everybody has stepped up in different key moments. Everybody made their contributions.

There have been several times where we needed a specific guy to come out and show us that he could give us something, and we’ve had multiple guys do that along the way, from number 1 to number 15. We are truly a team, and everybody is just as equally important on this roster.

When we’re good defensively, it’s not just one person, it’s everybody buying into the system, buying into laying it all out there for one another, fighting for every single loose ball. Taking the charges, getting moving screens called on them, things that make us tough to play against.

In a season like this with so much unpredictability, Coach Ataman kept the ship headed in the same direction.

We all have stepped up to help get the team back where we needed to be.

I have to give credit to Coach Ataman as well. He’s remained consistent with the way that we operated over the last three years. He’s a confident coach, and he gives a lot of confidence to his players. He allows guys to play to their ability and to their potential.

In a season like this with so much unpredictability, where we often didn’t know who was going to be available, or who might go down with COVID, Coach Ataman kept the ship headed in the same direction.

Even though we weren’t playing as well as we needed to play early on in the season, he didn’t make huge changes. He stayed confident. He stayed with his players. He stayed with the system. And he knew that at some point, once we found our rhythm, once everybody got back healthy, that we were going to go on a run. That takes a lot of guts. It takes a lot of courage to stay with a ship that looks like it’s sinking.

WHAT THE FUTURE HOLDS

There was another reason that it was important for us to get this done this season: The future is uncertain for a lot of us. The only thing that’s certain is that Anadolu Efes is going to look a bit different when next year rolls around.

This was the first time in my career I’d ever been on a team longer than one season. I’ve been here three years now and created lifelong friendships with a lot of guys on the team. For all of us who have been through this journey, winning the title put that final stamp of approval on everything that we’ve been through.

It’s such an amazing story, how everything went down.

We went from being eight or nine new guys joining the team in that first season; figuring each other out; going all the way to the EuroLeague championship game; losing in the final but winning the Turkish League Championship for the first time in 10 seasons.

We came back the next year with the motivation to be the best team, to prove that we deserved to win the title, and played amazing all year. Then COVID kind of ruined everything.

Then this past summer, there was a lot of talk about me going to the NBA or guys signing contracts elsewhere. But we all decided to come back. We all came back to Efes for another season for a chance to accomplish what we all felt we could.

To finish it the way we did—winning the Turkish League and the EuroLeague—we proved we were definitely the best team in Europe, no debate about it.

It’s a beautiful story, a wonderful story. It’s a special group of guys, a special team, and a special part of each and every single one of our careers that I’m sure we will remember for the rest of our lives. We’ll always have this to share.