When the men’s basketball European Championship entered the elimination stage, not many people could guess that the first team that was hit by the cold actually won 21 points in the group match. What defeated them was to lose the trump card Gary Nelly before the match, and the group match stumbled against the Italian team.
But after watching the competition, I knew that this epic elimination match was the most wonderful scene in the history of human competitive sports, and the key man who decided to decision of a game was a person who was ejection halfway: italy coach Gianmarco-poceko.
The turning point occurred in the third section. The emotional pocheko was dissatisfied with the punishment and ate the second technical foul. Instead of shouting loudly at the referee, he turned around and hugged every member of the coaching staff and the players in the bench, then walked to the opposite bench and gave high-five to the other coach, he greeted each other with his head held high, but at the moment when he walked out of the court, his eyes suddenly became sore and tears spilled on the spot.
Boceko said goodbye to the team
As a coach, boceko certainly knew what was going to happen next: at that time, the Italian team was 6 points behind, while the opposite yokiki played an unprecedented dominance. The scene was absolutely downwind, no coach was on the spot, and the fiasco seemed to happen.
“If you give up, the game will end early.” Before boceko left, he just wanted to tell his players that he wanted to continue fighting until the last second.
Fight back from this moment! Three different players sent out assists, three points in No. 0 spissulian! The Italian team suddenly burned out amazing fighting spirit, killing the opposite side unprepared. In the fourth quarter, the Italian team launched the next 16-2 wave, firmly holding the fate in their own hands and taking the game down.
At the moment when the final whistle sounded, boceko raised his hands and rushed into the stadium. In the reporter’s encirclement, he shouted over and over again, “We shocked the world! We are not 12 players, but 12 Lions!”
After he calmed down, he was still passionate, “they are the best team. They may even be the best team in the history of Serbian basketball, and they are probably the strongest team in the history of European games, they have yokiki. This young man is terrible and of the same grade as brother alphabet, but we won. We went all out and even won the best opponent. What else to be afraid!”
The journalist of Lithuania reminded him that in Athens in 2004, Italy won the team of Lithuania, reached the final and finally got the silver medal, so that should be the best game in Italian history.
Boceko interrupted him immediately, “Today is the best, the best in the history of Italian Basketball. We devoted ourselves to it and created history. Many people think that 2004 is the best, and I think it can rank second now.”
“I have a say. I was on the court for that ball.”
Poceko used to be the best defender in Italy.
At that time, he was in conflict with the players of Lithuania.
Fast Attack chased the body and stopped for three points (he got 17 points in that time)
At this time, the reporters remembered that pocheko was once an athlete, and he was also a legend in the history of Italian basketball in the era of players and one of the greatest point defenders in the history of Italy, in Athens in 2004, boceko, wearing the No. 9 jersey, was the master, ranking fourth in the competition with 4.3 assists per game. In the 1-point victory over the final champion argentina in the group stage and the semi-final victory over lithuania, boceko scored 17 points (against china in the group stage, he also won two pairs of 10 points and 12 assists).
In fact, he was 32 years old in 2004. In an era when his career was generally not long, he was a real veteran at that time. He almost missed this olympic games, but not because of his strength, but because of his violent temper.
It’s not easy to handle at first glance
Born in 1972, boceko started his career in 1991but didn’t enter the national team until 1997, which was considered a late success. In fact, pocheko won the league and the Super Cup double championship in 1999, leading the Serie A weak brigade vareze, which was considered to be a hit. However, in that year, he had a dispute with the famous coach tanjevich, he was excluded from the list of the European Championships in 1999. Although the new coach recakati recalled him to the team, he did not have his name in the European Championships in 2003.
Therefore, there are not many representative works in his national team career, only the 2004 Olympic Games and the 2005 European Championships.
Many people are lamenting that if it weren’t for the violent temper, boceko would have a much more successful career than this. This is also true, but not true. His name was known throughout Europe when Pacheco was shining. However, he was only 1.81 meters, but he was extremely fond of scoring when playing the point guard. In his time, this style was not very popular with the coach, and his defense was not good enough. On the other hand, generally speaking, NBA really recognized european players when dirk was in the second grade in 2000 and gasol was running in 2001, and boceko was about to be 30 years old at that time.
In 2001, Ginobili led Bologna to the Serie A championship, while boceko’s average score in that year was 27 points.
Red hair, impressed
Pocheko once challenged NBA. He joined the summer league with Raptors in 2001, but the Raptors at that time had no European background and he failed to stay. But on this trip to America, he made arrogant Americans remember his name.
At that time, the summer league was out of scale, and several teams played several practice matches in Salt Lake City. But before that, his Varese team had played warm-up matches with the Spurs. After the match, Duncan mentioned his name specially, “that guy red hair, I was so impressed……”
On Spurs, boceko left a deep impression on Duncan.
He also created history, playing against Jordan in a warm-up match in Chicago, and even snatched a ball, which was listed as “the first Italian in history who stole the ball from Jordan” by the reporters “. In salt lake city, he contributed 7 points and 6 assists in the first game, but his height and athletic ability were questioned, and his age was not enough for him to stay.
However, he left an unforgettable episode.
In that summer league, boceko was fouled by his opponent. He found the referee and complained. The coach of the other side came over and said to him, “Shut up, this is NBA!” Boceko remembered that the coach said a few other words contemptuously, similar to “go back to Italy, you can’t adapt to the intensity and rules here.” Pocheko glanced at him and did not speak back.
After 10 seconds, pocheko grabbed the ball right and hit three points from 8 meters away (the three point line of NBA is 7.25 meters). He walked up to the coach and shouted, “is that it? In NBA, this ball is also three points, isn’t it?”
In the last match against Spurs, boceko played 20 minutes and scored 21 points. At the age of 29, he didn’t wait for the NBA contract, but ESPN specially gave him a whole report titled “Are we really sure we want to let him go?”
Italy and America warm-up match before 2004 Olympic Games
His violent temper still remained unchanged. In 2005, he fought with the team manager again and was directly kicked out of the big list. Then he went to Spain and Russia to continue his wonderful performance. In 2010, in the applause of the fans, 38-year-old boceko announced his retirement. Then he started a program as an analyst, not only studying Serie A, but also explaining NBA.
In 2012, boceko began to coach, but every team did not stay long, including his mother team vareze. In 2019, in Serie A’s Sassari team, he was banned for 10 games before the start of the playoffs due to poor management, and finally left early. In 2021, he worked as a teaching assistant for Messina in Milan, and he left again in less than a year.
Then on June 2, 2022, he became the new head coach of the Italian national team.
It has only been 3 months now.
How crazy is bocheke who became a coach?
He called on players to show themselves and become a member of a team, but to have flesh and blood, to leave their own marks in a great team, under his inspiration, all the Italian players who can continue to play are back. They are preparing for the World Cup qualifier and the European championship together. The 34-year-old veteran Gary Nelly also returned after signing the Celtics. He said, “This must be my last session, brothers, let’s fight again.”
But in the last FIFA World Cup qualification, the Italian team’s number one star was non-contact injured. After the game, he was diagnosed with a rupture of the cross ligament. This injury is likely to leave him to rest for a whole year.
After Gary Nally was injured, boceko’s approach was completely different from that of other coaches. He took the initiative to talk about the injury.
“There is something more important than basketball,” he said. “I saw the excitement and desire to fight with this team in Gary Nelly, and his teammates respected him, he may be the strongest player in the history of Italian basketball.”
“I know what it means to have a knee fracture (later diagnosed as a rupture of the cross ligament). I can feel his pain and we all hope that he will be fine.”
“With Gary Nelly, we have a chance to win the European Championship, but I don’t regret it. I regret that he didn’t take part in the adventure he deserved.”
“From now on, we will fight for Gary Nelly.”
Boceko found the International Basketball Federation before the match and asked for an increase in the number of people on the list of European Championships. He believed that too few players and too close matches would lead to a greater chance of injury to players, however, his application was rejected by the secretary general of the International Basketball Federation. Boceko was not depressed because of this. He just told the players that they wanted 12 people to rotate to ensure everyone’s health.
There is no offensive core and organizational core gary nelly, which means that all the tactics before the match should be disrupted and the team should look for offensive tactics again. At this time, his trusted disciples, all stood up.
Long tomei, the old team, took over the task of strategy. Fontakio, who had just signed a jazz contract, made a stronger investment of fengshui ball. Mei li, the core of the inner line, took the initiative to find a confrontation, and even could be hard-headed with jokedge; paola, who just went to the NBA to play the Summer League, became extremely tough, while spisso and Manion began to hold the ball more actively in the two back games, and their desire to attack exceeded the previous definition of defender.
Just like he used to be.
Italian guns
They lost to Greece and Ukraine in the group match because they ranked fourth in the winning and losing relationship and wanted to play against Serbia. In the prediction of the outside world, no one predicted that they would win.
“They are very strong, really strong,” he asked the players, “What about us? Are we weak?”
Inspired by him, the Italian players completed the incredible task. They won Serbia 8 points and advanced into the top eight. But it is not incredible, because boceko also stressed several times that they lost 4 points to another team that won all Greece.
Don’t forget, at last year’s unsuccessful race, Italy defeated Serbia and got the Olympic tickets.
After receiving the interview generously, he greeted every Serbian player in the player channel. When he arrived at Jokic, he said, “You are the strongest player I have ever seen, you must cheer up.”
On the way back to the dressing room, when boceko saw brother alphabet preparing to enter, he unexpectedly jumped directly to brother alphabet.
“Yannis is really good. I like him too much.”
For those excellent players, his love is from the heart.
He hopes that every player can have a unique character and be remembered because of its uniqueness.
When winning the game, he was surrounded by the players in the middle of the court. This time he didn’t cry. He told the players, “I’ll give you my credit card and buy whatever you want. It will be fine if it is maxed out.”
So, how did his character players respond?
“They said, you ‘d better give the correct password, or we will kill you.”
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