Meet old friends: Jasikevicius leads Fenerbahce against Zalgiris
Fenerbahce and Zalgiris Kaunas will meet today in the Ulker Sports Arena in Istanbul, in a game that counts for Round 15 of the current EuroLeague season.
Both teams started the season below expectations and Fenerbahce decided to make a coaching change after the Round 13 loss against Barcelona. Dimitris Itoudis left the team after a season and a half at the helm of the Turkish team and was replaced by Sarunas Jasikevicius, an ex-player of Fener for a short period in 2011. Zalgiris was also very close to pull the trigger and change the coach. There were reports that Andrea Trinchieri already agreed to sign with the Lithuanian powerhouse, but in the end the management decided to keep Kazys Maksvytis.
The debut of Jasikevicius on the bench of Fener was against Monaco last Friday and the players reacted well to the coaching change as the team from the Turkish capital won an important game in the race to the playoffs, 86-74. Meanwhile Zalgiris’s struggles continue as they lost another home game last round against Partizan, the third defeat in the row in the EuroLeague that takes the Lithuanian team to a 5-9 record and 15th place in the standings.
The game has a special significance for Sarunas Jasikevicius. The Lithuanian spent his last season as a player in his hometown in 2013-14 and then after two years as an assistant coach he took over as head coach of the green and white team and he made history with them in a very short time. He was named the best coach of the Lithuanian LKL in his first season and then in 2018 he lead the team to a surprising EuroLeague Final Four presence. Zalgiris finished 3rd and convinced everyone that Jasikevicius is on his path to a legendary career as a coach too. He was also praised after that season because of developing players that were underrated in the EuroLeague but had a breakout season that year. Kevin Pangos and Brandon Davies were fairly unknown and got big contracts at Barcelona after that year (Davies left in 2019) while Vasilje Micic moved to Efes and became EuroLeague MVP.
Both teams are desperate to win tonight but Fenerbahce is the clear favourite. Zalgiris has ambitions to reach the playoffs but with so many good teams this season it’s very unlikely that they will qualify. Fenerbahce meanwhile should reach at least the playoffs with this roster and the mid season coaching change might be the shock the team needed to perform better.
