The veteran Spaniard overtook Felipe Reyes to become Los Blancos' all-time record appearance holder.
Sergio Llull shined for Real Madrid on his special night
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After being honored by Real Madrid for breaking the club’s all-time appearance record, Sergio Llull showed that he still has plenty to offer by playing a full part in his team’s 96-86 overtime victory against Valencia Basket in the Spanish capital on Thursday.
Tuesday’s game against FC Bayern Munich saw Llull play game number 1,047 for Los Blancos, moving clear of retired big man Felipe Reyes – who was on hand to present Llull with a special commemorative jersey a few minutes before tipoff.
Llull is like a fine wine
Llull, of course, demonstrated that he is still the man for the big moment by draining the title-winning shot in last season’s Turkish Airlines EuroLeague Championship Game against Olympiacos Piraeus, and his performance against Valencia left no doubt that – even aged 36 – he remains a key member of coach Chus Mateo’s puzzle.
The star guard netted 16 points, making 4-of-8 from three-point range and 2 of his 4 attempts from inside the arc, in addition to dishing 2 assists, grabbing 2 rebounds and making 2 steals in nearly 27 minutes on the floor.
Importantly, that included Real’s opening two baskets in overtime to set his team definitively on their way to victory, and the Real fans showed their appreciation by loudly chanting his name as the game’s final few seconds eventually ticked away.
A tough stretch for Real Madrid
Llull happily acknowledged the Real faithful and later admitted it was a tough task to come through another overtime thriller in the wake of last week’s quadruple-overtime record breaker against Efes.
“It’s hard to play more than 40 minutes [again] but at the end of the day we won, so we’re happy,” he said. “We did a good job in overtime; we started to play better defense and control the rebounds."
Real head coach Chus Mateo acknowledged that his team struggled to find rhythm throughout the contest, which comes at the end of a grueling schedule of four EuroLeague games — including five extra quarters — in the last eight days, joking: “We don’t know which city we’re waking up in when we play so many games!”
One thing is for sure, though: whichever city Coach Mateo and his players wake up in, Sergio Llull will be there and ready to play.