What better gift for UnipolSai on his return to Serie A, an extra-luxury package complete with a bow and victory. Niccolò Mannion (Openjobmetis Varese) took home both the prize for best player and best Italian of the thirteenth round of the championship. The Lombards’ new acquisition overtook Andrejs Grazulis (Dolomiti Energia Trentino) and David Logan (Givova Scafati) for the MVP race, then Daniel Hackett (Virtus Segafredo Bologna) and Amedeo Tessitori (Umana Reyer Venezia) for the title of ‘The Best ITA’.
The return of the King as in ‘The Lord of the Rings’, however the protagonist here is not equipped with bows, shields or swords, but with red hair and a basketball. We are not talking about a fantasy, we are talking about Niccolò Mannion’s debut in the Openjobmetis Varese uniform. The Lombard team was experiencing a dark period without victories between the championship – four consecutive defeats – and the FIBA Europe Cup – still without successes in the second round after the 5-1 in the first phase – for this reason it was necessary to insert a new engine, thus trying to make the machine work differently. The triumph obtained at the Vitrifrigo Arena against Carpegna Prosciutto Pesaro does not completely chase away the dramas, as Varese remains second to last on par with Nutribullet Treviso, but it was certainly a way to overcome the lack of results and try to close the group in a dignified manner forward. It was a boy with the number 4 on his back who made the two points possible: Mannion didn’t start very well in the first few minutes, but he had the foresight to understand when his team needed a boost of energy to put things right; subsequently came the comeback, the lead and the first away victory for Openjobmetis in the championship. On the evening in Pesaro, the native of Siena scored 26 points (top scorer of the match) with 9/17 from the field – of which 4/6 from behind the arc – and 4/4 from free throws; in addition he suffered 5 fouls, collected 4 rebounds, recovered 2 balls, distributed 1 assist and recorded 20 in the evaluation item, all this in his first 27 minutes in the red and white uniform.
“The real secret is that we trained really well yesterday before this match. It was my first training session with the team, the scouting was very good and we did what we needed. I’m happy to be back here in Italy, I’m happy to be able to play here in Varese. I really want to thank everyone for the support, it’s been a fantastic welcome and I’m very happy to be able to play again. I can give what the team needs, what the coach asks for and needs. Now I still feel a little out of shape in terms of condition, breath and leg stability, but when I get back to 100% I want to be a better defender, I want to move the ball better from one side of the pitch to the other and I hope to give everything what the team needs” these are the statements of Niccolò Mannion to DAZN after the victory of his Openjobmetis Varese against Carpegna Prosciutto Bologna. His first words already retain so much clarity and attention, so much desire to get back into the game and show all his talent. The awareness of having to work to return to having sensitivity with the ball and being able to sustain real minutes in both competitions, but this maturity is precisely the extra weapon that the Lombard team will be able to exploit thanks to the point guard born in 2001.
With the 26 points scored on Saturday evening, the Arizona University product came close to the career high he had set nine months ago with the Virtus Segafredo Bologna uniform (27 points vs Umana Reyer Venezia), however he tied his own record of triples scored with 4 (out of 6 attempts), just as happened in the 2021/2022 season again against Carpegna Prosciutto Pesaro. What made the crowd get up from their seats, however, were the 21 points scored in the fourth quarter alone (of the 27 total scored by Varese), in which Mannion shot 63.6% from the field and transformed the score of the game from 67 -61 to 81-88. Within a different context and with a different role, the native of Siena will try to improve the figures recorded in his two seasons in Bologna: in the 2021/2022 season he scored 9.4 points (51.9% from two, 42.3% from three and 73.6% free throws), 4.6 assists, 2.3 rebounds and 11.9 rating in 17.6 minutes; in the 2022/2023 season he scored 10.5 points (53.1% from two, 36.7% from three and 87.0% from free throws), distributed 3.3 assists, grabbed 1.9 rebounds and recorded a 10.1 rating in 21.6 minutes on average. In coach Tom Bialaszewski’s plans, the former Baskonia player will have more responsibility with the ball in his hands and a fixed role in the starting fivethus being able to dictate the pace and facilitate the game of the snipers that make up the Openjobmetis roster.
2023-12-25 13:48:13
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