Valencia, a city that has been buffeted by the wind for two weeks, now welcomes basketball fans with a kind of early spring. This week, from Thursday to Sunday, the city hosts the lavish Roig Arena, a pavilion wrapped in snakeskin that opens its doors to the first major sporting event in its history. Among the eight best teams in the ACB League there will be no shortage of its tenant, Valencia Basket, the revelation of the season and a team that aspires to be much more than a friendly host. Pedro Martínez’s squad will try to reconquer a trophy that it won in 1998 led by Nacho Rodilla, 28 years ago, when it was still a sketch of the team it is now. To do this, they will have to embrace one of the least meaningful clichés, that this is the tournament of surprises, when, in reality, only Unicaja (winner in 2023 and 2025), has managed to break the duopoly between Real Madrid and Barcelona, perennial favorites in the Cup and champions of all the remaining editions between 2010 and 2025.
They, the greats, sections of two of the most powerful football clubs in the world, are always the main candidates when the Copa del Rey arrives, the great celebration of Spanish basketball and a tournament envied throughout the world (it will be broadcast in 153 countries). This year, from February 19 to 22, Valencia will receive more than 10,000 fans from outside the province. The never seen. Next to it, in an open space of 90,000 square meters, the Fan Zone will be installed, and at the end of that meeting area for fans, in the old Fonteta, the former home of Valencia, the always suggestive Minicopa is already being played, a competition for the promising ones that people like Ricky Rubio, Doncic, Wembanyama and Pradilla have gone through.
after long months in which he has managed to dazzle in a Euroleague tied to an adjective that everyone seems to have agreed on: wild. And yes, it is a wild Euroleague, but also exciting for a fan and a team, Valencia, which has been installed in the upper zone for many days – it is third with one more victory than Barça and Madrid -, in those positions of playoff with which all the teams in Europe dream. Valencia sails pushed by the wind of its identity. Pedro Martínez has turned this team into a recognizable and exuberant team. All of Europe enjoys watching the joyful play of this gang of athletes who come with a subversive spirit to a competition in which Unicaja has shown in the last three years that it is possible to question the hierarchy of the two greats.
. Another team with an author’s signature, that of Ibon Navarro, called to rub shoulders again against rivals guided by several wise men of the orange ball: On Thursday night (9:00 p.m., DAZN) the champion, the Malaga team, and the undisputed leader of the ACB, Madrid, will face each other. Also on the starting line are those who would really be surprising champions on Sunday: Joventut, Valencia’s rival this Thursday (6:00 p.m., DAZN), Baskonia and La Laguna Tenerife, who will face each other on Friday, and Murcia, opponent of Barcelona.
The tournament will be uncorked by Valencia and the Penya of the fantastic Ricky Rubio, a rival against whom he was defeated on February 8 in Badalona (90-87). Pedro Martínez’s men will also fight against the statistics that give the host very few options. No team has lifted the trophy in their home country since Elmer Bennett and Dejan Tomasevic’s Tau Vitoria won it in 2002, almost a quarter of a century ago. Only one other team has managed to emerge triumphant from a Cup at home: Kevin Mcgee’s CAI Zaragoza, in 1984.
Pedro Martínez arrived at the press conference prior to the Cup with his ideas written on a piece of paper. On that sheet he summarized what he wanted to communicate: Pressure? It’s not pressure, it’s an opportunity. Messages well thought out so that they would reach the press and, in turn, their staff. “We live it naturally and with enthusiasm,” he said. He does not like to leave anything to chance and in Valencia no one knows if the coach reaps the fruits of the good work of his superiors, or if it is the other way around and everything has started to add up with the arrival of Pedro Martínez. Probably, for the sum of the three parts and some more.
The 64-year-old Barcelona coach is entering his 15th Cup. “Yes, but I haven’t won any…” he says with sarcasm. Then he will add that, despite the good moment he is experiencing in Valencia, where he has landed on his feet in a very complete project, both due to the infrastructure and means at his disposal and due to the financial commitment of the patron, Juan Roig, or the enthusiasm of the fans, he does not like to talk about it. “I don’t feel comfortable and I try to live in the present to the fullest. But yes, I am delighted, I love the club, I love the team, and I trust their competitiveness and their ability to give their best.” Although Pedro Martínez adds a nuance: the favorites are because of their recent past. “In the Cup all the teams start from scratch.”
