Xavi Pascual: "We had too many up-and-downs"

During the post-match press conference, Zenit head coach Xavi Pascual shared his emotions from the guest meeting with UNICS (75:71). In addition, he noted the key moments of the game and spoke about Dwayne Bacon's condition.

— First of all, I want to congratulate UNICS. We had too many up-and-downs and especially 16 turnovers. This is why we couldn't win this game. At the end of the game we had some opportunities to come back to the game, to open shots, to be over the score, to equalize everything but we couldn't score and nothing else.

— In the first quarter it seemed like Bacon had an injury, but then he played. Did he play with injury?

— Yeah, he had a problem in the knee. He played with pain and some painkillers. We'll see tomorrow how he's going to be.

— Were you surprised by Zakharov's performance?

— On the beginning of the game we lost Trent Frazier, after that we have to play a little bit different and he played a very good game. To tell you the truth, he lead the team, everything that he did, he did in the right way. I congratulate him for this game.

— I would like to ask about your foul. What caused such emotions? The behavior of Marcos Knight?

— No, I never complain anything from the opponent, never, never. I am already here in Russia a lot of years and you know that I never speak with any player and I never complain anything about any player. Just I was complaining one foul to the referee, nothing else. Especially about Marcos Knight I have big respect, I know him all his career, he is an amazing player.

— For the past two matches in a row, UNICS has beaten Zenit. What makes the Kazan team an uncomfortable opponent?

— It's clear that, as of now, it's the best team in the competition in terms of numbers defensively and offensively. It's a very difficult opponent, we know. This is big derbies all the time. Finally, it's one or two actions that decide the game. Unfortunately, in both games we couldn't win, but a long competition in front of us, for all of us, and still I think 22 games more, so we'll see at the end.