A pair of Real Madrid stars lit up the airwaves with a sublime play late last month. Here's how they explain it.
November's No. 1 play explained
Article
2 Mins read
It looked for all the world like something that had been worked on and synchronized countless times on an empty court.
When the Real Madrid tandem of Vincent Poirier and Sergio "Chacho" Rodriguez turned two great split-second passes into a resounding alley-oop dunk late in a November victory over Maccabi Playtika Tel Aviv, everybody noticed.
So exquisite was the result that everybody wanted to know: How long did it take to get that timing down pat?
"We didn't practice," said Poirier, who initiated the sequence.
"The play against Maccabi was the first time that we did it," Rodriguez confirmed.
In fact, Poirier reveals that he had seen another backwards, between-the-legs pass on-line a couple of days earlier, and when he saw Rodriquez slipping behind the Maccabi defense over his shoulder, eh spontaneously recreated what he had seen.
"It was the easiest way to pass him the ball," said Poirier, and as soon as he did so, he knew what was coming next from Rodriguez, who ranks second all-time in the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague with 1,781 assists.
"I know Chacho, he knows me, so I knew he was going to throw the alley-oop."
And Chacho knew what Poirier would do with it.
"For me, it's just throwing the ball close to the hoop and he had to dunk," he said. "It's a play that has a great percentage."
The rest was viral history, except to hear the two protagonists tell it and say who had the better pass.
They were in synch on that, too.
"It was mine," said Poirier, whose career assist total of 134 is a little more modest. But "I think that both passes make the action better."
Chacho was more than happy to credit his big man.
"My pass was bad," he said. "I threw the ball [behind him] but he had amazing timing to catch it, good hands to catch it, and to finish.
"The play speaks for itself."