The new basketball season in Spain will begin this weekend with the Endesa Super Cup, in which Barcelona, Real Madrid, Unicaja and UCAM Murcia will seek their first title. Juan Núñez (Madrid, 20 years old) returned to the Spanish competition this year, after his time in Germany, after signing for the blue-and-red club with a three-year contract. However, the Spanish point guard will be able to leave the club at the end of each season to go to the NBA, where San Antonio Spurs chose him in the last draft in a trade with the Indiana Pacers, the team that selected him first. The Madrid native left his future in the American competition up in the air this Monday at the presentation of the Endesa League: “I’m not thinking about the NBA, I want to have a good year, compete for titles and enjoy it.”
Núñez’s last game in Spain was in 2022 with Madrid, where he was trained, and precisely against Barcelona, when the Whites lifted the league title. This time he is on the other side and will fight against his former team in the first semi-final of the Super Cup (18.30; Unicaja and Murcia meet at 21.30). “Saturday’s game is very important because we are playing for a title. We have a great team to compete for everything,” he said. The point guard left the white club in the summer of 2022 in search of some minutes that he was not playing in the Spanish capital and an important role. His destination was Germany, where he joined Ratiopharm Ulm. He spent two seasons there, where he won the league title in the first year.
Núñez said that he has felt a great welcome in the dressing room of Joan Peñarroya, the new Barcelona coach for this season. “I have teammates with whom I have already played in the national team and other veterans like Laprovittola (also ex-Madrid player) who gives me a lot of advice,” the point guard confessed. His choice for the Blaugrana team is greatly influenced by Peñarroya and his style of play, as he explained. “I have seen the teams he has coached and he has a very dynamic way of playing.” In addition, he feels more motivated and rested than in the two previous seasons in Germany. “I really want to play. I have had two summers without stopping and this year I have taken advantage of the opportunity to recover from some discomfort I had and to rest,” added the player.
Endesa League 24/25
The Endesa League was presented with the visit of a player from each of the clubs that make up the league this year. Juan Núñez was the representative of Barcelona. In the case of Real Madrid, another point guard, the Argentine Facundo Campazzo. The newly promoted LEB Oro teams also presented themselves: Força LLeida, who achieved promotion to the top category of Spanish basketball for the first time in their history, and El Leyma Básquet Coruña, after 56 years without reaching it. The match that will open the competition will be Joventut-UCAM Murcia; Real Madrid will visit A Coruña to face the newly promoted team; Barcelona will receive Granada at the Palau; and Unicaja will play against Girona, after having won the Intercontinental Cup in Singapore.
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