Nick Calathes rolls back the clock as Fenerbahce make history

In what should surely go down as Euroleague’s Waiting for Godot game, Nick Calathes picked his moment. Fenerbahce downed AS Monaco to, by a couple of hours, become the first road team ever to win a Game 5.

This was a weird one. Samuel Beckett would certainly have approved of the surreality. Fortunately, BiE has a less than sober Irishman to break down what happened.

The Waiting for Godot game

Don’t worry Fenerbahce fans, we’re going to get to the cool bits soon. This scribe however is Irish. Not only is he Irish but he is writing in the style of Brendan Behan, that is to say with some pints in him. Moreover, he is a fan of the surreal.

My countryman, Samuel Beckett, was an utter master of the surreal. I once ran a football team named for one of his plays. Real Krapp, named for Krapp’s last tape. I figured that one day I’d call on him to describe what I witnessed on the hardwood. Yet it was still a surprise to see it be such as it was on Wednesday.

First there was the clock stopping mid play with nobody noticing late in the third. That alone would have merited Beckett. Yet, no, Euroleague and the powers that be had more in store for us early in the fourth.

What appeared to be a man with some connection to AS Monaco was showing something on his phone to the refs. Nobody seemed to know what was going on. Eventually it had no impact bar an interminable delay. Thus, with scores tied, it was like the teams were beginning anew. What we didn’t realise was that our protagonist, Nick Calathes, was unmoved by it all.

To the moment

Nick Calathes has evolved his game under Sarunas Jasikevicius. It is a form that has allowed him to add years to his importance on the floor. Calathes is far more secure with the ball now. He takes fewer risks. Yet he still passes as well as anyone in Euroleague.

That wasn’t the man Fenerbahce needed late in overtime against AS Monaco. No, they needed the old dog. The guy that never saw a three point look he didn’t like. A man for whom joie de vie and joie de mort are one and the same.

Boom. Headshot. Mr Foles is going to have to retire his moniker. There’s a new Big Dick Nick and he plays for a team in Istanbul. To find that confidence, that vigour, in the moment is why we love the greats. Remember, for all his success Calathes has fewer Final Fours than you might think on his resume. This was a big moment.

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