Even in the position of challenger, Ergin Ataman was in his element on Saturday, facing the swarm of cameras at a press conference. Under the eye of his pivot Mathias Lessort, the Panathinaikos coach shared a few jokes with his Madrid counterpart Chus Mateo – “I especially want to beat him to remain the last coach to have won the Euroleague twice in a row (2021 and 2022). with Efes Istanbul) » -, and Real winger Dzanan Musa whom he had benched three seasons ago in Turkey. After a “sabbatical year”, which saw Efes miss the play-offs, the Turkish wizard is forty minutes away from a third European coronation, Sunday evening in Berlin (8 p.m.). “So far, we have achieved everything that our owner Dimitris Giannakopoulos and our fans predicted,” laughed Ataman. The technician had threatened in the middle of the quarter-final against Maccabi Tel-Aviv to leave his post if his team failed before the Final Four.
