Boston Celtics coach Doc Rivers has described his team’s franchise-record 18-game losing streak in 2007 as “hell.” Maroussi coach Nikos Linardos can relate. His team is 0-15 and players are jumping ship because they’ve been underpaid for months.
Yannis Gagaloudis and coach Nikos Linardos
Linardos, however, isn’t giving up. There are 10 games remaining, including at PAOK in the northern city of Thessaloniki tomorrow evening. “I have to fight with my players until the end,” he said after a team practice Thursday night.
The 48-year-old coach is well-respected in Greece. He was an assistant for Maroussi for much of the past decade, when the club was in the elite class with Olympiakos and Panathinaikos. Back then, ownership threw lots of money at the team, but not now.
Two starters have left because they weren’t getting paid on time — or in full. Linardos, like his players, had been assured before the season that the financial problems would be resolved. They haven’t.
Linardos played for the Greek national team that won the 1987 EuroBasket championship. Greece defeated the Soviet Union 103-101 in overtime for the gold. US-born Nick Galis averaged 37 ppg for Greece in the tournament, which is credited with reviving interest in basketball in Greece.
Red Auerbach and the Celtics drafted Galis out of Seton Hall in 1979, a year after selecting Larry Bird. He hurt his ankle in training camp, was released and never played in the NBA, but he’s a legend in Greece, where he played from 1979 to 1994.
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