Nikola Vucevic on international play: ‘USA would have been stronger if we played by NBA rules’

Nikola Vucevic: “Since Lonzo Ball got hurt, we haven’t been able to get the results we could have. It’s messed us up a lot. When he was playing, we were at the top of the East for a while, which was a good thing, but it wasn’t realistic, but if he was there, we would have been fighting for anywhere from third to sixth. The rest of us are more focused on scoring: LaVine, DeRozan and me. He brought us all together, he sped up the game, he meant a lot on defense, and he protected our best players with Caruso… His numbers may not have been impressive, but he meant a lot to us. We worked with young players, and then we had a lot of injuries. Trade talks also affected us and kept us from getting the results we thought we could, but when the results don’t follow, change comes… DeRozan is gone, Caruso is gone, the team is younger, and they want to go in a different direction. We’ll see how the season goes and make a decision based on that.” – through EuroHoops.net / August 25, 2024