Tiago Splitter’s men finally brought their five-game losing streak to an end in Round 21
Unheralded quartet stepped up as Paris rediscovered its winning touch
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Regular Season
Round 21 of 34
Group Regular Season
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A lot can happen in 39 days.
Back on December 6, 2024, Paris Basketball stunned Europe by going to SEF and beating Olympiacos Piraeus 90-96. That victory wasn’t just Paris’s 10th in a row, but it saw the side from the French capital go clear at the top of the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague standings with an 11-3 record. TJ Shorts and co. were on top of the world – or so it felt.
Fast-forward to January 14, 2025, and Tiago Splitter’s Paris team entered Round 21 in a far different mood. Five successive defeats had seen some doubts start to surround the EuroLeague newcomer, with Paris falling to sixth spot and appearing to be in free fall, yet they bounced back in style with a confidence-boosting 88-84 win over Anadolu Efes Istanbul.
Shorts would typically be front and center of a win like this and while he did put up impressive numbers, he largely had his teammates to thank. At various points during the contest, different players came to the fore for the hosts.
Early on, Leo Cavaliere provided a boost from the bench with 5 first-quarter points, then Maodo Lo showed why he is the perfect foil for Shorts by coming in and keeping the machine ticking along. A little later, 7 third-quarter points by Yakuba Ouattara were a major plus, and Mikael Jantunen hit two huge triples after not making any for the last eight games, missing 24 three-point shots as a result.
“I haven’t made a lot of shots lately, but I’ve got my coach, my teammates, everybody trusting me,” Jantunen told EuroLeague TV afterward. “I know I’ve got to shoot the ball. At some point they’re going to go in. My teammates kept finding me and I kept shooting it. I knew I was going to make them at one point and yeah, made them in a good spot today. But it feels good. I’m just happy that we got the win, that’s all that matters. Good start to the double week.”
The important thing for Paris is that it has rediscovered its winning touch after a tough 39 days in EuroLeague play. As Shorts alluded to, they simply had to find a way to get the victory, particularly at home.
“Everybody knows we were in a rough stretch, but that’s part of basketball and we had to dig ourselves out of that hole,” Shorts said in his postgame comments. “When you get home games in the EuroLeague, you’ve got to find a way to protect it. Today, we were able to do that, get the feeling of winning again and get back on track.”
Paris will be aiming to put those words into action on Thursday night, when it welcomes the 5-16 Maccabi Playtika Tel Aviv to Adidas Arena.