The basketball world mourns the death of José Piculín Ortiz at the age of 62. The former Puerto Rican center had been battling colorectal cancer for a long time. Considered a legend in his country, which he represented in four Olympic Games and five World Cups, he also played for Barça in the early 90s. The center arrived at the Catalan club from Real Madrid and became a key player in a team coached by Bozidar Maljkovic that featured players like Epi, Solozábal, Audie Norris, and Andrés Jiménez, who won the Copa del Rey and were finalists in the European Cup, a tournament they lost in Paris against the formidable Jugoplastika.

Five days before hosting the final four of the Basketball Champions League, the Palau Olímpic saw how the second half of the match between Asisa Joventut and Unicaja could not be played due to a technical problem with the scoreboard. The match was delayed by more than 20 minutes and could not be resumed after halftime (53-33), which caused an absurd situation. Mayor Xavier García Albiol fueled conspiracy theories.

The current star of the Liga Endesa speaks Catalan. Oriol Paulí scored 27 points against Barça and 28 against Unicaja. His current form is key for Hiopos Lleida as they seek to secure their permanence. This Saturday's opponent is Recoletas Salud San Pablo Burgos. “I'm in a good moment. In sports, dynamics are very important. There have been weaker moments during the season too, but now I'm in a very good physical and mental state. The goal is to try to extend this moment as much as possible because it helps me play with a lot of confidence,” he says.Since this season, Paulí is the ambassador of Catalan basketball. “For me, it's an honor. There are many Catalan players, and that they thought of me fills me with pride. It makes you think you're doing things right, not just as a player but also as a person. When the Catalan Federation proposed it to me, I didn't hesitate for a moment because it's a very big milestone,” he acknowledges. The forward is eager to wear the Catalan national team jersey again. “I would be very excited. I think the last game I played with the Catalan national team was when I was 15 years old. To wear the Catalonia jersey again would be very special. I couldn't be at the centenary match against Argentina, and now I would love to be able to do it. Every time I meet Ferran Aril, president of the FCBQ, I ask him about it,” he admits.

Days after securing third place in the Women's EuroLeague and just before starting the play-offs for the Women's Endesa League title, Casademont Zaragoza announced that their coach Carlos Cantero will not temporarily lead the team as he is taking paternity leave. His wife Paula has just had a son (Mateo) and, as the club explains, "the coach will exercise his right to suspend the contract for birth and care of a minor, in accordance with current labor regulations".

Barça reacted to the European elimination with a victory on the court of Kosner Baskonia (92-95). Despite the evident physical and emotional wear, the blaugrana team got through a very difficult match. Trent Forrest missed the triple that would have sent the game into overtime. "It is an important victory that comes on a very difficult day," stated Xavi Pascual, who emphasized the prominence of his inside players. The culé team proved strong on a court where only Valencia Basket had won before.

Two years in a row stumbling on the same stone. Barça lost on Monaco's court and will not play in the play-offs for the EuroLeague title (79-70). Europe expelled the Catalan team before the end of April. It will be the fourth time in history that the Catalan team is not among the eight best teams in the competition. Furthermore, it's three consecutive years without even smelling a final four.

First box or stripe overcome. Barça debuted the play-in with a good grade. The Catalan team eliminated Estrella Roja (80-72) and will play for a ticket in the fight for the title against Monaco, who lost to Panathinaikos (87-79). Despite an unexpected eclipse when they were winning by 22 points, the Barça team played with personality to secure the victory at the Palau Blaugrana.

Barça lost on the court of a sensational Hiopos Lleida (90-80). Oriol Paulí, who trained at the blaugrana club, became the executioner of the culé team, which wasted an 8-point difference at Barris Nord. The forward scored 27 points, 7 assists, and 7 rebounds. The Catalan, who arrived at La Masia when he was only 12 years old, has worn the Barça jersey in all possible categories, from youth to the Liga Endesa.

Barça did the job and gave themselves a boost to extend the season in Europe. The Catalan team, who didn't want to depend on the Dubai result, effectively neutralized Bayern Munich (95-69) and will play the play-in to access the play-offs. Their first opponent will be Estrella Roja. If they overcome the challenge, they will still need to beat Panathinaikòs or Mónaco to enter the title race, where Olympiacos is already calmly waiting.

Hard blow. Asisa Joventut lost on AEK Athens' court (72-67). The green-and-black team couldn't manage an eight-point lead and was eliminated from the Basketball Champions League. Two final referee decisions, a mistaken throw-in and an uncalled foul, harmed the Catalan team, which was left unable to compete in the final four in Badalona.

After two European defeats last week, Barça returned to winning ways against Surne Bilbao (90-61). Without success from the three-point line and wasting many free throws, the Basque team was unable to compete at the Palau Blaugrana. Xavi Pascual reached victories in the ACB with a win percentage of 77.3%, the best of all. Before the coach from Gavà, a total of ten coaches had achieved the record.

When I was a child, Andrés Jiménez spent hours leafing through the comics and graphic novels his grandfather sold at a kiosk in Carmona (Seville). The only condition was not to open them too much so they would look new and could be sold without problems. That passion for illustrations never disappeared and a few years later he set out to create his own works.Jiménez changed Carmona for Badalona, as he signed for the mythical Cotonifici (1978-83). “In Carmona, not much basketball was played, but I was tall. When I was 13 years old, I was already 1.97 meters tall. I signed up for one of the Height operations that the Spanish Federation carried out and I was selected for a 15-day training camp in Cáceres. My report, which said I was willing, but that I didn't know how to play basketball very well, went around. Two years later, when I was already discouraged and wanted to quit basketball, two Cotonifici executives made me an offer”, he recalls.His great luck was to coincide with Aíto García Reneses, a coach with a privileged vision for detecting talent before others. “I landed in the best possible place because Cotonifici needed to train young players”, says Jiménez. For years, the man from Seville combined basketball with his creations. “I have always liked to draw. When I arrived in Badalona, I did not continue my studies at the Industrial School, which at that time was a bit neglected. I found out that the Pau Gargallo School of Art offered applied arts studies. I entered advertising and design and I saw that I was good at it”, he recalls.Fernando Martín, who always saw him drawing during the Spanish national team gatherings and knew he was a big fan ofAsterix and Obelix, nicknamed him Jimix. Jiménez played for Joventut for three seasons (1983-86). “When I played for La Penya, I used to do advertising campaigns, but when I joined Barça, I started to find it difficult to find the necessary time to draw. We traveled a lot and the matches were very intense. For two years I kept a weekly comic strip, but then I stopped for 20 years,” he confesses.

Xavi Pascual got the diagnosis right: Barça cannot go for Europe with half-measures. The Catalan team lost on AS Monaco's court (93-86). The Monegasque team, which only registered eight players, a very unusual fact in professional basketball, recovered a nine-point deficit against a very discouraged Barça rival. The home team played with more intensity and took advantage of a home refereeing to end up shooting 17 more free throws.

After suffering one of the most worrying defeats of the season, Xavi Pascual sounded all the alarms in a press conference. "I am the main person responsible for today's humiliation," said the coach. Barça even trailed by 32 points against Panathinaikos, at which point some Barça fans expressed their displeasure at the Palau Blaugrana. "When the season ends, it will be time to explain many things to you and for us to talk about everything. From now until the end, I will try to remain as calm as possible and for us all to be on the same page: players, directors, press, public... And then, when we finish, there will be time to evaluate, to talk, to think, to see where we are, to see where we will be, and to see if we will be there," he stated. His contract ends in the summer of 2028.

When Badalona beats strongly, La Penya dreams big. Asisa Joventut ran over AEK Athens to plant its flag in Europe, where it is one victory away from reaching the final four of the Basketball Champions League. Led by Ricky Rubio, the home team put on a display of strength (88-66). The quarter-final tie, which is tied at one win each, will be decided on Wednesday, April 15th, in Greece.

A Barça with many adversities did not fail on the court of Casademont Zaragoza (86-92), where they had lost in their last four visits. Xavi Pascual had the absences of Tomás Satoransky and Jan Vesely and rested Will Clyburn. Juani Marcos, the only pure point guard, added 9 points and 4 assists. The home team could not avoid their eleventh defeat in the last twelve games. "We are as we are. The difficulty is very great, but we want to take steps forward," acknowledged Xavi Pascual.

A little while after being eliminated in the second round of the WTA in Bogotá by the Russian Anastasia Tikhonova (1-6, 6-4 and 3-6), the tennis player Marina Bassols went on her social networks. While still digesting the defeat, the blanenca, 26 years old, read a handful of messages with death threats. "Get yourself good life insurance and a lawyer because I'll kill you when you get home", "I've paid a cartel to kill you", "I will assassinate you, I know where you live" or "You are officially dead".The situation that Bassols, who is ranked 203 in the WTA rankings, experienced is not an isolated case. Elite athletes have had to get used to living with fierce criticism, derogatory messages and death threats. Some of the messages come from fans unhappy with their performance, but others from people who have lost money on a sports bet.

Barça lost on Zalgiris' court, a direct rival in the fight for the play-off positions in the Euroleague. The Lithuanian team's strategy prevailed over the Blaugrana squad for the second time this season (83-71). Moses Wright and Sylvain Francisco, two players that the Palau Blaugrana dreams of, completed a great performance. The center scored 18 points and 11 rebounds. The point guard contributed to the home team's victory with 14 points, all in the last period, and 8 assists.

A Catalan app designed in Tarragona aims to revolutionize the world of women's training. "We are developing an application that uses artificial intelligence to help women understand their menstrual cycle. This allows for controlling all symptoms and adjusting personalized training recommendations in real time. The added value is to provide progressions, intensity, or volume," summarizes Àngel Miguel, one of the co-founders of Drop It.The app caught the attention at the Indescat AI Summit, where it was voted the most interesting proposal from a pitch with six start-ups from the sector. “During the menstrual cycle, women go through four phases and each requires different training. There are applications on the market that allow tracking their period and symptoms, but few adapt it to real decisions in the field of training. We are looking for personalized sessions that adapt in real-time to each woman's performance. We have created a method that takes all the user data, both those they record themselves and those provided by the most common apps. Our artificial intelligence detects patterns and gives recommendations. The objective is to generate a unique model for each woman that specifically adapts to her cycle and her symptoms,” analyzes Miguel.

Barça overcame Unicaja and avoided a third consecutive defeat in the Endesa League (97-91). The Catalan team squandered an 18-point lead, but knew how to react in time. Jan Vesely had a key impact in the decisive minutes. The 35-year-old Czech center scored 10 points with two three-pointers in the last period. "Every year I try to improve and now I'm feeling comfortable with three-point shots," he said. "We held on for 15 minutes at a good level, but then we diluted and survived as best we could. The wear and tear from Friday was very great," admitted Xavi Pascual.