Darren Hilliard: "This time we will have three players who can carry the team"

"Every time I was free, I wanted to come to Maccabi Tel Aviv."

"I went through a difficult year, but I'm 100% healthy."

"Hunter and Thomas said only good things about Israel, except for the traffic jams."

"Oded Katash was a legend, and there will be no problem between us."

"If you have patience, we can go all the way."

The new stranger in an interview with Walla!

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29/06/2022

Wednesday, June 29, 2022, 2:30 p.m.

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Oded Katash is presented as the coach of Maccabi Tel Aviv at a press conference (Photo: Roni Kanfo. Video editing: Aviad Balili)

The flood of names and signings of Maccabi Tel Aviv in the last week and a half did not miss Darren Hilliard, who concluded his terms at the club a little over a week ago and was officially announced on Tuesday (Monday).

"I've already talked to almost all the players who signed," he says in a special interview with Walla!

sport.

"We are very excited, everyone, to get to be together."

"I know they've seen a lot of ups and downs. We will not win every game, we do not have a team of superstars who will start winning from the beginning, and I know there will be hard times where we will look for ourselves. Not everything will be rainbow, It will be difficult, and if there is patience we can go all the way - a championship and a cup in Israel and we will also try the Final Four in the Euroleague. "

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"We do not have a group of superstars that we will start winning from the beginning, and there will be hard times" (Photo: screenshot, Darren Hilliard's Twitter account)

Hilliard will be the 13th player to move between Maccabi Tel Aviv and Bayern Munich, an almost inconceivable number given the fact that the Bavarians rose to prominence only a few years ago.

When he received the offer from the Yellows, he consulted with two of his teammates last season, Othello Hunter and Dashon Thomas.

"They told me amazing things about Maccabi and the city, and the only bad word I heard from them was about the traffic on the roads in Tel Aviv. The turnover of players between the clubs is coincidental. I had a difficult year, and I'm glad I can wear a Maccabi uniform."

"I wanted to come to Maccabi for a long time. Whenever I was available, I looked at them and wondered if they would be interested in me. For the last four years they did not look at me, but now David Blatt returned to the club and I felt it was very interesting. I did not tell my agent to contact them, but end They finally wanted me. They're rebuilding their culture, what Maccabi really was until a few years ago. As an actor and as a person. "

"I was not too injured in my career, and nothing made me miss too long. It was harder this season, but now I am 100 percent healthy. The first injury was in the knee, and it happened in training. I do not remember what movement I made, "I was lying on the floor and grabbed my knee. It was a strange accident. I came back, and then I broke my collarbone in the first game of the playoffs in Barcelona. I went for a kidnapping and was hit in the thigh by an opposing player. Luckily, it's just a bone."

"I did not think of it that way. When I broke my clavicle, my mind was completely different. I knew my body was recovering fast, and I really thought I could return to the playoff final in Germany. I worked non-stop and got stronger, I thought I would be ready for the fourth game, but the coach thought it would not be enough "Right for the team. I was qualified and could play."

"If you can keep all the positions, you will play."

Hilliard in front of Omri Caspi (Photo: Danny Maron)

Hilliard is a graduate of Villanova University, and he left for Europe after a career that included two not-so-bad years in Detroit and another season with a few games in San Antonio.

At the end of the acclimatization season at Basconia, two years came as a rotation player at CSKA Moscow, and another year as the one who was supposed to lead Bayern. "I feel I will be one of the most important players at Maccabi," he says. A significant role.

"Maybe not like at Bayern, because we had players who were willing to take on their role, but it is clear that much more than I had at CSKA. The ball will be more with me and I will be a playmaker who produces for others as well."

"Naturally I like to play in position number 2. I'm bigger than most players in that position. Maybe they's faster, but I have good leg speed. I have the size to play in position number 3, it depends on who I keep. I look at that. "If you can keep a high level in several positions, from 1 to 4, you will be on the field."

"The team is organized differently now. With me, with Lorenzo Brown and another guard coming, we can create more. Building a team that depends on several players, not just one player. Wilbkin did a great job, but this time there will be three players who can carry the team and play on the ball. "And off the ball. It's a long season, you can't expect a single player to carry you, good as it may be."

"I could have played again in the playoffs."

With Vladimir Luchic at Bayern Munich (Photo: Reuters)

With all due respect to the additional Brown and Guard, who is expected to be Wade Baldwin, Hilliard signals that he should also be taken into account when it comes to crucial shots.

"It's one of the things I love most, and want to do more," he says.

His coaches did not always go with him to the end: he started his career under Valimir Prasovic, worked for two years with Dimitris Itudis and has now finished a season under Andrea Trincieri, three of the continent's top coaches.

"I learned a lot from my previous coaches, and each of them looks at the game differently. Trinkieri is very tactical and strategic, Etudis gives you a lot of freedom, but they were different, they have their method. Prasovic has his way, and they have the ways. "I played for great coaches."

"His most prominent feature is that he was a legend, one of the greatest in Israel. He has already been there and succeeded at the highest levels, and he has qualities of his own. I have no problem listening to him,

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