Nikola Vucevic: “Since Lonzo Ball’s injury, we haven’t been able to achieve the results we could have. It disrupted us a lot. When he played, we were at the top of the East for a while, which maybe wasn’t a realistic result, even though we were playing well, but with him, we would have fought for anything between third and sixth place in the end. The rest of us focus more on scoring: LaVine, DeRozan, and me. He brought us all together, sped up the game, meant a lot on defense, guarding the best players with Caruso… Although his numbers might not have been impressive, he meant a lot to us. We tried with young players, and then we had numerous injuries. Trade talks also affected us, preventing us from achieving the results we thought we could, but when results don’t follow, changes come… DeRozan left, Caruso left, the team got younger, and they wanted to go in a different direction. We’ll see how the season goes, and then decisions will be made based on that.” -via EuroHoops.net / August 25, 2024