Olympiacos defeated Aris 92-81, and Giorgos Bartzokas, in his statements, referred to both his team's victory and the EuroLeague Playoffs.
The Greek coach also spoke about the injured Tarick Jones, as well as Kostas Papanikolaou, who reached 800 appearances with the Olympiacos jersey.
In detail, what Giorgos Bartzokas said:
"Even though we made some childish mistakes and lost leads, we immediately brought it back up. Even at the end, we made a mistake, we misread Aris's defense, but the fact that we won made the fans happy. It was an offensively beautiful game."
Regarding Tarick Jones: "We need to see what will happen with his suspension. Given that we have a league game next week, it's very important to have him so he can get some rhythm ahead of the playoff games. We play on Tuesday after that, but it's not up to us."
Regarding first place in the EuroLeague: "We are waiting for Friday to see who our opponent will be. We believe that whoever it is, they will be a very strong team, and we need to prepare because in the EuroLeague, nothing is given to you. You have to bleed, sweat a lot, concentrate, and see the games as a great challenge. And of course, because we are very ambitious, we need to live up to our own ambitions and those of the fans."
Regarding the fact that Olympiacos doesn't know its opponent, how easy it is to prepare: "Whatever answer I give is correct. If you stay out, if you don't have official games, if you don't have rhythm, then you prepare. It depends on how you look at it. If you have a positive mindset, in any case, what you get, you have to turn it into a positive thought and move forward."
Regarding whether he would like Panathinaikos as an opponent in the EuroLeague playoffs or in the final: "Here in Greece, they think that everything revolves around us, in our microcosm, that everything is Olympiacos - Panathinaikos. Here we are talking about 20 teams that played in the EuroLeague for so many matchdays, and all teams, and Panathinaikos of course, deserve to be here. Whoever our opponent is, we will be as consistent as possible, as professional as possible to fight for our team. It doesn't matter who we want, who we prefer, who we don't prefer. If we were to prefer someone, we would look to lose some games. Since we have never done that and never will, whoever comes, we will respect them and play as best as we can."
Regarding Kostas Papanikolaou: "I agree, he is a "legend of the sport", as you called him. Do you know what it means to play 800 games for Olympiacos? It's a fantastic achievement, it shows his consistency, how systematically he worked all year, and ultimately what he offered to the team. The 800 games, especially for Olympiacos, I mean the pressure that Olympiacos has. It's a team where you can never relax, you can't be laid back, you always have to be motivated because defeat is forbidden. 800 games for Olympiacos are more than for other teams."