Carlik Jones Lands in Belgrade: 'They're My Brothers'
The American landed in Belgrade after national team duty with South Sudan and admitted on camera that the departure of last season's best players still stung.
Nikola Tesla Airport, Monday evening. Carlik Jones walks out of the terminal with a bag over his shoulder to find only a Meridian Sport camera and a wall of questions waiting for him, about a team that barely resembles the one he left in May. He’s smiling, but he doesn’t hide that the summer caught him off guard.
The trip to Belgrade was long and grueling. Less than 24 hours earlier, Jones had played the deciding game of South Sudan’s qualifying window, weaving through the defense the way only he can and hitting the winning basket that put the team a step away from a spot at next season’s World Cup in Doha. South Sudan closed out the window unbeaten, 3-0, with the American flawless in all three games.
His national team duty meant missing Partizan’s first preseason game. Without him, the black and whites, under coach Joan Peñarroya, beat Zenit 83-71 to open their preseason with a win. The point guard is now joining a squad that, by his own admission, looks quite different from the one he left before flying out for the qualifiers.
That very difference in the roster was the first topic at the airport. We wrote about last season’s team being broken up back when Peñarroya admitted Partizan is building a side without Parker, and now the locker room itself has weighed in, through a player who has been at the club for a single season without major turnover.
“Yeah, I’m definitely surprised. I wish them the best, I’m happy for them, but this is a new chapter and we have to adjust,” Jones told reporters as soon as he stepped out of the terminal.
Losing teammates he’d built relationships with over the past two seasons hit him harder than he was willing to admit at first. When the conversation reached that subject, his tone shifted slightly.
“A lot of the guys who left weren’t just my teammates, they were my brothers”
He said it briefly and without much explanation, like someone who has been sitting with that thought for a while and has no interest in turning it into an interview about other people’s decisions.
Partizan doesn’t have the euphoria that carried the past two seasons this fall, and Jones knows that better than anyone watching the club from the outside right now. That’s why he spent most of his remarks on the fans, not on his own form or the club’s ambitions.
“Man, I just ask the fans to work with us, to be patient, this is a new chapter for all of us. We’re trying to get back to where we were two years ago, when the fans traveled for away games, celebrated wins. When the airport was packed when we came back from road trips. We want to bring that winning culture back,” the point guard said.
There’s a familiar face in that story of renewal, too. At Partizan, Jones will again share the court with Ethan Thomas, his former teammate from the NBA, so the chemistry on at least one part of the floor is already there. Mixing experience from other leagues with a player who remains the backbone of the offense should ease the adjustment period he himself mentioned.
“I’m excited to be here. New chapter,” he added briefly, the only sentence in which he sounded completely at ease.
What’s Next for Partizan?
Answers to the tactical questions will have to wait. Asked about a EuroLeague playoff spot, a question that has followed every Partizan interview automatically over the past few seasons, Jones wouldn’t bite.
“I’m not going to talk about the playoffs. We’re taking it step by step,” he said, wrapping up.
Realistically, that’s the only sensible answer right now. A team with this many new faces can’t set season goals before playing its first official game, and Peñarroya is still sorting out rotations without players who spent weeks away on national team duty. Jones is coming back into the form he showed across South Sudan’s three games, and those minutes matter more right now than any preseason game he missed.
The next test comes within days, once Partizan continues its preseason cycle and it becomes clear just how quickly the chemistry with Thomas and the rest of the new roster has actually come together.
