Do what you can, with what you have, wherever you are.”
The world of sports often places us before the need to improve, where attitude, commitment and perseverance must take the place that does not yet belong to experience, skill or respect instilled by the weight of a career.
We have just experienced a Eurobasket that will be remembered for the improbability of its outcome.
Or at least, where reality has taken a very different path than expected.
The Spanish team, captained by Sergio Scariolo, reached the championship in the midst of an uncertain transition, full of debutant players, profiles without a presence in a continental championship and lacking the icons that raised the team to the top of basketball in recent times.
With an immense group spirit, against all odds, the flag has remained at the top.
In a tournament with the presence of NBA figures, MVPs and All Stars — Luka Doncic's Slovenia, Nikola Jokic's Serbia, Giannis Antetokounmpo's Greece or Rudy Gobert and Evan Fournier's France — the strength of a supportive team has prevailed , where a balanced collective effort has multiplied the potential of the locker room.
We always say that friends are the family you choose.
The boys of basketball call themselves La Familia, transmitting year after year a winning spirit that does not understand great figures.
With the generation of the golden boys exhausted, of which only Rudy Fernández remains, the group continues to accumulate a history of unstoppable success.
A total of 12 medals in the last 15 championships is the best legacy for a DNA that doesn't seem to have a brake.
Perhaps this has been the year where we have seen the most new faces, perhaps it was the occasion where they started with fewer favorites.
However, this situation has not damaged the faith of the group, hit by last-minute casualties, wounded by unexpected injuries, but excited to squeeze the most out of the group's talent.
A block of workers who have emptied themselves for each other until they achieved what seemed like a utopia.
Everyone has played a role in the general gear, and that is difficult to achieve in a locker room.
The strength of the Hernangómez brothers has been a pillar to support the group;
the discipline of Alberto Díaz, always electric in defense making up for Sergio Llull's loss, has dazzled us all;
the sobriety of Xabi López-Arostegui, brave in every match or the personality of Lorenzo Brown, who has silenced the noise with immense talent on the parquet.
The image of Rudy, leading a group of young people at the age of 37, has been wonderful, inspiring for a generation that will have to take the reins from this moment on.
Scariolo affirmed that they had found an oasis in the first kilometer of the desert, a wonderful phrase, and that water was the sweat of all rowing for the same goal.
In sports, it is not always the most gifted who wins, but the one who best knows how to use his resources in search of victory.
This championship is a great mirror for the youngest, an example for knowing how to be in life, placed before the fruits of fellowship, rapport and strength of a well-aligned locker room.
The Spanish team has signed a feat that will be remembered for a long time, one of those golden pages that are already recorded in the history of sport.
Surely, one of the ones that give off the most pride over the years.
Far from fulfilling an expectation, so common in our sport, the men of Scariolo signed something much more complex: to show that limits are there to be broken.
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