Caen BC. Diamé: “With Fabrice, we wanted to go to the same place together. We won’t make it
Moïse Diamé (captain of Caen BC): ” It’s hard. We train for more than ten months, we make a lot of effort… Normally, a basketball game is 60 to 80 possessions, we have played 43 or 44 and it ends with a contested shot with the board , at the buzzer… When it comes down to a possession, you can do them all over again in any order… It’s complicated but you can’t redo history…
We played a team which is not there by chance, which plays very well in the basket, which made very big shots like the last one. We leave disappointed, we wanted to do more but it’s the law of sport. We can’t do much except cash in and try to rebuild ourselves with that.
We have our experience, we knew where we wanted to be. The road was not easy, we fought and this match is the image of it. We came back from hell, we managed to come back and equalize and then there is this improbable shot…
This is the most difficult defeat to cash in my career. Everything stops suddenly, there is frustration and I am also frustrated for Fabrice (Courcier, the coach). The adventure ends today for him, as for Franck (Danet, the president) and Eric (Fleury, the sports director). The adventure stops between Fabrice and me, he called me more than two years ago. We wanted to go to the same place together. Tonight, we know we won’t make it (moved)…
It remains a team sport, we had a very difficult journey. On the starting line, there were 28 teams and up to five seconds from the end, you could still be a finalist. We will have to digest that to open a new chapter. It’s an eternal restart, I know my job, I know what adversity I have to face. I will take a few days to rest but I will return to work as I do all the time to be ready in two or three months. »
Bryson Pope (Caen BC winger): “Fabrice (Courcier) is a coach that I really appreciate. He’s a real, honest person. With him, I rediscovered the joy of playing basketball. I evolved too. I like him a lot, like the whole team. It annoys me almost more for him than for me. He gave so much all year, even in a difficult situation. It’s really hard, especially compared to him. His tears are very touching… The team really wanted to do it as much for him as for us. That’s what’s most annoying.
Since I’ve been in Caen, I’ve also met Franck (Danet) and Eric (Fleury), I work with them. It’s a page that turns. But I appreciate them very much. I will miss them. They are super invested in the club, they have given everything in their own way. They have nothing to reproach themselves for.
We all spoke at one point, we all said things to each other during the season. Just before the playoffs, we said to ourselves that it was now or never, that we had to forget the lost matches and get back together to have a good run. I’m proud of what we showed, especially at the Palais des Sports. It’s a shame it ended like this, but we didn’t give up. »
Tom Wiscart-Goetz (back of Caen BC): “It’s very difficult, we believed in it until the end. A shot like that, in such an important moment, it hurts very, very badly. We still congratulated each other in the locker room. The season was very difficult but we fought until the end, we believed in it until the end. The leaders also congratulated us. We have to keep our heads up, not be ashamed, be proud of ourselves despite the defeat. It will make us grow for the seasons to come.
Our weak moments were far too important today (Sunday May 29). We showed a lot of character, against a great team who also played in front of their home crowd. Coming back from this far is almost impossible. We lack control in the weak moments.
Losing in the semi-finals on a buzzer shot stuck in my mind for a while. It will make us all grow, the others like me. It was a complicated season. Personally, I would have liked to have had more playing time because I knew that the team might need me at some point. It was a bit the case this evening and I’m happy that Fabrice (Courcier) trusted me. The season was complicated, I broke away, a bit like the team. »