ARG – Pablo remembers where it started

ISTANBUL (FIBA World Championship) – Watching Pablo Prigioni run pick and rolls with Luis Scola is the FIBA version of Stockton to Malone, everyone knows it is happening but no one can stop it.

Canada coach Leo Rautins called him the best point guard in the tournament, but for Pablo Prigioni playing at the FIBA World Championship is just a continuation of his love of basketball that began long ago. “I was four years old,” he reminisced.

“It was at the social place in my small city in Argentina, where we can practice basketball, tennis, soccer, we can do everything inside. I decided to try basketball.”

Not surprisingly, given his feel for the game, the sport came naturally to Prigioni from the beginning. “Oh yes, I enjoy it a lot from four years until 12 or 13, when I really wanted to play soccer for a little while. But I live all the time with basketball, and I think as you start to grow up you feel that you really want to play (professionally).”

The 186cm point guard made his international debut at the 2003 South America Championship, and first stepped out on the world stage at the 2006 FIBA World Championship in Japan, backing up Pepe Sanchez and handing out 2.6apg in little more than 12 minutes per contest.

Following Sanchez’s retirement from international play he got his chance as a starter at the Beijing Olympics, and that is where the world first saw the devastating Prigioni-Scola pick and roll.

He chuckled when asked when he ran his first ever pick and roll. “I don’t remember,” he laughed. “But I start to do more when I start to be a professional, I start to learn how to play that move, especially with Luis in Tau (Ceramica).”

Why is it so effective? “I don’t know,” he shook his head, blushing a little at the comparison with Stockton and Malone.

“I think that happens if you play a lot of years with the same teammate, then you start to know him a lot, he knows you a lot, and it’s practice. Repeat this move one, two, three times every day and you recognise where the advantage is.”

That advantage will be crucial in the Quarter Final against Lithuania (available live on FIBATV.com), but Prigioni believes it is the commitment to defence that will get his country through to their fifth straight Semi Final in world competitions.

“I think they have excellent players, all Lithuania players are aggressive with their shooting,” he said. “Whatever rules we are going to put on defence, we must do it with 100% heart. If you take any decision, if you do it 100% for sure it is going to work. If you take an excellent decision but do it 50%, for sure it won’t work.”

It is an answer that goes back to his young days playing at the community centre near Rio Tercero, playing with his heart and enjoying the game he loves. And that is exactly the advice he has for youngsters playing basketball back home in Argentina.

“Just try to enjoy the game, try to make friends with this game, I think that is most important,” he said. “And if the destiny has something for them, something special like playing professionally or for their country, or winning a lot of championships, that will be their destiny.”

FIBA