Honestly, didn't care if Turkey won or not. Having Alpi screw up the 4th should be motivation to keep working his game. He's leveling up but needs more to reach his potential.
I wonder how much foul trouble impacted Sengun's play. And most of those fouls were pretty dumb. He did look like a boss for a while in the 2nd quarter, but was awful in money time.
Germany players all hit timely shots and grabbed timely rebounds. For Turkey, not everyone contributed like they did previous games and Sengun got gassed, took some bad shots but without him, game would have been over much sooner.
That's what a bad game from him looks like . The ts% is higher than I expected. The perception of a bad game is more related to not impacting the game as before than filling in the stat sheet. He destroyed the other teams, but this time he was limited by germany and he made bad choices down the line, creating the bad play sentiment.
On the flip side, I liked that he took those 3s, even though some of them were not good choices. He worked on it, they look better and he wasn't afraid to take them.
The last five minutes Alpi and the whole Turkish national team forgot what they did the best and started making bad decisions. Hope he learns from this experience. Also, what a bullshit decision with Schröder as tournament MVP. If you absolutely have to award a player from the winning team, then Wagner and not Schröder.
In fairness he absolutely had a very bad few mins down the stretch. And that absolutely did decide the game. And the TS% was before his last few mins w/ Turkey in control 76-71 + the ball. I'm sure it finished a bit worse w/ the misses but It's not the Rockets so I can't be bothered to check But yeah dude had near 30 midway through the 4th on outstanding TS accumulating near 40% of his team's points and was a +10 in a 5 point game at that point. Since when does that sound like a guy who cost his team the game? Reactionary culture sucks.
Giannis " this is probably the greatest accomplishment of my life. Carrying a country of 12 million." Always have liked his modesty starting with the oreo cookies.
Despite the loss, Alpi proved in this tournament that he is a winning player. Losing a freaking EuroBasket final in the last 60 seconds against a team that beat Team USA and won the WC just two years ago is not like getting eliminated in the first round of playoffs or something. Yes he made some dumb mistakes but mistakes will happen if you have to carry the team as hard as he did. Alpi, Larkin and Osman are great but ultimately the rest of the Turkish roster was just too weak for this level. Even Bona who made some decent plays also made some very bad mistakes. I am happy that he will return to the Rockets injury free. This loss might have a similar effect on him like 06 loss had on Nowitzki. He will be a different and better player after this incredible summer.
Alpi, unfortunately, failed in the crucial moments. I am scared of disappointment unless he gets that closer mentality down. He ain’t got it yet , that’s fo sho.
This was also my first thought and while he definitely made some avoidable mistakes, I think it's not very fair to say that he is mentally weak. This EuroBasket final is an extreme situation, and he basically had Cedi and Larkin. Larkin also made some costly mistakes but I also don't blame him. Our big 3 did everything they could but you can only make it so far with no support from the bench. I think that Alpi was the best player on the court today but Wagner and Schroeder had the better team around them. Korkmaz for example plays and looks like he is ready for retirement. Bona brings some energy but is very prone to some real bad mistakes and his inability to catch a pass reminded me of some of the worst moments of Ömer Aşık today. Even in that last play Larkin just basically gave him the ball, no one was able to get rid of his defender, there are 8 seconds left, you have the fatigue and the adrenaline, Alpi just tried his luck. It was a bad play, no doubt about it but it wasn't just a boneheaded mistake.
I didn’t say Alpi is mentally weak, just that he’s no killer, not yet anyway. Franz is a great player and Germany has better talent but Schroeder was the difference in the end. However, it could have been Alpi (but it wasn’t
