Alex Poythress: "We always play to the last possession, that's our competitive nature"
In an interview for Zenit TV, the blue-whites center Alex Poythress shared his emotions from the guest victory over Pari Nizhny Novgorod (73:75). In the last match against Volga team, the player scored 11 points and 3 rebounds.
— Alex, congrats, once you told us that the fight never stops. Was there a moment today when you thought probably that Zenit will lose?
— No, I mean as professional players we never think we're going to lose, we always play to the last possession, that's our competitive nature. The bigger problem is we have to do that the whole game, not when we just get down or when we're up, we have to keep fighting and keep fighting and keep fighting. Sometimes we relax when we get up and we just got far out of way not to do that but it's human nature. But again, we should be more professional and do a better job of that.
— You started very well and finished the game well but what happened in between? The coach said that probably Nizhny deserved the win more.
— I mean no. I don't want to say that. I think we deserve to win too because we did, we fought, we have some mental lapses out there but we still fought. That's like I said earlier we started the game well, we ended the game well, but sometimes we lose focus, me included and some of my teammates, but we just got to keep fighting and just stay in focus. Every game is going to be tough in this league, so we just got to keep playing.
— Zhora did the same as he did in Krasnodar. What did you tell him in the locker room?
— Good shot. I mean, we trust Zhora to make the shot, that's why Trent passed it to him, but anybody we trust on this team. We're on this team for a reason. So if it's Zhora, if it's Trent, if it's Dwayne, if it's me, Vince, anybody, if we pass, if we make each pass, we expect us to make a shot, so.
— And please describe: seven seconds to go, we're leading by two, and what happened next? And what did Xavi say?
— We just got to hunker down and get one stop. We fought, we fought, we fought and we fought, you know what I mean? And now we were up one, or up two, you know what I mean? Now we just got to, hey, we're putting the defensive line up, we're like, hey, we got to get a stop and get the rebound, and we end up doing that.
