Cukurova Basketball Mersin Yenişehir Club President Serdar Çevirgen, who knocked down Fenerbahçe Alagöz in the final and carried the President’s Cup to its museum, said that bringing the biggest trophy to their museum gives them great joy and that as a club, they will always work to win new championships without taking a step back.
Expressing that he believes that they have been climbing up step by step with Çukurova Basketball Club for 6 years and that they have established a team that will make Mersin proud with the big steps taken both in terms of infrastructure and A-Team and in the facility, President Serdar Çevirgen said, “We had the first fruit of this in the Turkish Cup last year. We won against Fenerbahçe in the final. Actually, our goal was to beat our opponent in the final series in the league as well, to reach the happy ending, but we played the final series without exactly 4 of our top 5 players. We had great bad luck, it didn’t happen. But we don’t take a step back. This is my philosophy of life. We prepared very ambitious for the new season. Actually, we were missing in the President’s Cup match. This time we didn’t have 4, but two very important players, but our players on the field fought perfectly, they never gave up. We said that we trusted them and expected trophies from them despite the shortcomings. They did what was necessary, they made us proud.Fenerbahçe also did a great job current is a team we respect, but I think we wanted more and we won. From now on, we will work with the goal of becoming a champion in all the lanes we compete in. The people of Mersin and Turkish Basketball will experience great success with Çukurova Basket. I wholeheartedly believe in that,” he said.
There’s no turning back this way
Referring to the coaching change in the middle of the season, President Serdar Çevirgen said, “We started the season with Emre Vatansever. Actually, he is a very good coach and I thank him very much for his efforts. He also had a share in the establishment of this team. I wish success for the future. However, sometimes it doesn’t happen. Our team couldn’t achieve the output we wanted, and we parted ways with mutual understanding, within the framework of love and respect, and we appointed Ekrem Memnun to lead the team. Ekrem is the only Turkish coach to win the Euroleague in women’s basketball and our biggest goal is to become the Euroleague championship. We saw that the tempo of our team increased. I would like to thank Ekrem Memnun and our technical and administrative teams for his success in the President’s Cup. I said it at the beginning. We are very assertive. We are assertive in every cup in every league and we will make all kinds of sacrifices for this. We will not turn from our path, We will not take a step back… Ekrem Memnun sweats for these goals as well. We are very pleased with it. The last cup match we played shows how right our decision was,” he said.
Chelsea Gray is here for it
Speaking about Chelsea Gray, who was selected as the most valuable player (MVP) of the President’s Cup final match, Çevirgen said, “The whole team struggled. I congratulate all our players one by one. All of them are the most valuable player for us. As for Gray. We wanted him to come to Mersin for this. He was also selected as the most valuable player in the WNBA, won the World Cup championship with the USA National Team and was the MVP of the final match. He is one of the best in the world. We knew he would do these things when transferring him to our club. I believe this performance will last until the end of the season. And together we will win more trophies,” he said.
It should be sanctioned
Addressing the issue of Jonquel Jones, who sent the news that he would not return to Turkey the day before the President’s Cup, Serdar Çevirgen said, “We made our contracts with our players in the summer months, and since there was no match on that date, we had the contract of our two players put on leave for the Christmas holiday. Later in October, this was the case. When the date of the match became known, we talked to our players and asked them to catch up with the match. It was a move we couldn’t figure out. Even if he had informed us the day before, we would have trained Bonner, who went to his country on leave, for this match. We tried to train Bonner again, but it didn’t happen due to the snowstorm in New York. After all, our other players fought well without Jones. and he won the trophy but this is really a shame and unfortunately i There is no proper sanction in this regard by FIBA. We made a plan at the beginning of the season and formed a squad. When Jones is the highest paid player not only in ours but also in Europe, it is inconceivable that he would act like this. We will fight for our rights in this matter until the end,” he said.
