{"id":104981,"date":"2025-08-29T19:30:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-29T19:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/104981\/"},"modified":"2025-08-29T19:30:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-29T19:30:09","slug":"kristaps-porzingis-enjoys-unbelievable-atmosphere-in-riga-fun-game","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/104981\/","title":{"rendered":"Kristaps Porzingis enjoys \u2018unbelievable\u2019 atmosphere in Riga: \u201cFun game\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Semih Tuna\/ info@eurohoops.net<\/a><\/p>\n

Riga, Latvia \u2013\u00a0Kristaps Porzingis revisited the intensity in international games, compared to his experience in the NBA Finals with the Boston Celtics in 2024<\/a>, but also enjoyed the atmosphere in Xiaomi Arena for the meeting between Latvia and Estonia<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a hard-fought game. The atmosphere was unbelievable. Maybe not the prettiest game from us. But I think fans enjoy this kind of game, when it is a battle, back-and-forth,\u201d the 30-year-old forward\/center said in a postgame press conference, \u201cIt was a fun game to be a part of. I am just happy that we came out with a win.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThese types of games, in the end, will be about switching and individual matchups. And they had a player we couldn\u2019t guard one-on-one,\u201d mentioned losing head coach Heiko Rannula, referring to Porzingis tallying eight of a game-high 26 points in the fourth quarter.<\/p>\n

The crowd support also helped Latvia rally past its Baltic neighbor on Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe intensity is there, for sure,\u201d the native of Liepaja compared the atmosphere to the NBA Finals, \u201cHere, in every game, for some reason it feels tighter, the court feels tighter. Maybe because I had seven turnovers or whatever, that\u2019s how I\u2019m blaming it on the court.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIn these high-intensity games, where it\u2019s so loud, you can\u2019t hear anything, there is a bigger chance for something to go wrong,\u201d he added, \u201cIt\u2019s extra important to keep a cool head in this kind of environment. To compare it, it\u2019s both high-level intensities, and those are the best games to be a part of as a player.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bouncing back from a disappointing loss to Turkiye on Wednesday<\/a>, the Group A hosts improved to 1-1 with a comeback win, pushing Estonia to 0-2.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am very happy that the team found the resources to respond. Starting from an amazing defensive effort, we completely changed the game,\u201d noted head coach Luca Banchi.<\/p>\n

Photo Credit: FIBA<\/p>\n

Read the latest News<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Semih Tuna\/ info@eurohoops.net Riga, Latvia \u2013\u00a0Kristaps Porzingis revisited the intensity in international games, compared to his experience…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":104982,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,590,85],"class_list":["post-104981","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104981","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=104981"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104981\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/104982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=104981"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=104981"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=104981"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}