{"id":9436,"date":"2026-08-25T19:55:00","date_gmt":"2026-08-25T16:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rytasvilnius.lt\/en\/?p=9436"},"modified":"2026-08-25T20:04:55","modified_gmt":"2026-08-25T17:04:55","slug":"rytas-begins-preparations-for-the-season-team-veterans-newcomers-and-youth-system-players-in-practice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rytasvilnius.lt\/en\/news\/rytas-begins-preparations-for-the-season-team-veterans-newcomers-and-youth-system-players-in-practice\/","title":{"rendered":"Rytas begins preparations for the season: team veterans, newcomers, and youth system players in practice"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ng-star-inserted\"><span class=\"ng-star-inserted\">Rytas basketball players have officially turned the page to the new season. The capital&#8217;s club gathered for their first joint practice, where team veterans, newcomers, and youth system players all took to the floor.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"ng-star-inserted\"><span class=\"ng-star-inserted\">Head coach Nedas Pacevi\u010dius shared the team\u2019s initial working mood:<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"ng-star-inserted\"><span class=\"ng-star-inserted\">\u201cThe mood is very good, truly. Today my first words to the team were that I personally felt I missed the process a little bit, and all those faces in general. It\u2019s great to see both new faces and those we worked with last year \u2013 the players, the coaches. The emotions are great, but as always: the first few weeks are always like this, and later on you enter that routine which becomes somewhat monotonous, but our job will be to make sure it doesn&#8217;t become that way,\u201d said Rytas head coach Nedas Pacevi\u010dius.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"ng-star-inserted\"><span class=\"ng-star-inserted\">Team newcomer Cassius Winston, having finished his first practice with the squad, also shared his positive impressions about the team and life in the capital:<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"ng-star-inserted\"><span class=\"ng-star-inserted\">\u201cI feel good. I feel good. It was fun out there, getting out there with the guys, just meeting everybody, the coaching staff, and just getting up and down, getting the season started. They&#8217;re cool, yeah. They&#8217;re cool, funny, hard-working, so it&#8217;s gonna be a fun season. I&#8217;m catching up on sleep right now, relaxing. It&#8217;s a lot colder than I would like, but it&#8217;s been fun. The city&#8217;s great, my family loves it, so it&#8217;s been good,\u201d Cassius Winston smiled after practice.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Rytas Vilnius Get to Work for 2026-2027\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/SyJzD8JRNqE?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p class=\"ng-star-inserted\"><span class=\"ng-star-inserted\">During the first practice, the players worked without contact \u2013 full focus was placed on physical conditioning and a smooth introduction to the system.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"ng-star-inserted\"><span class=\"ng-star-inserted\">At the moment, the Vilnius side is not training at full strength, as five players are currently defending the colors of their national teams. Gytis Radzevi\u010dius, Matas Jog\u0117la, and Augustas Mar\u010diulionis are working in the Lithuanian men&#8217;s national team camp, Kay Bruhnke is wearing the German jersey, and newcomer Ricky Lindo is competing for the Panamanian team. These players will join the club once their national team window commitments conclude.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"ng-star-inserted\"><span class=\"ng-star-inserted\">\u201cWe don&#8217;t have much time until our first game, but we are grateful to our youth system, which really rescues us in this situation. Especially during these first few days, both the older and younger players come in with great energy. We hope to maintain it for as long as possible,\u201d head coach N. Pacevi\u010dius commented on the youth players&#8217; contribution. \u201cObviously, those players will get a few days off because they carry a significant workload with their national teams, and they will join us after our first friendly game.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"ng-star-inserted\"><span class=\"ng-star-inserted\">Rytas veteran Gytis Masiulis also shared his thoughts on returning to the court:<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"ng-star-inserted\"><span class=\"ng-star-inserted\">\u201cIt\u2019s really nice to be back on the court and meet up with my friends. The first practice was introductory. We worked a bit on the physical side, put up some shots, didn\u2019t overcomplicate things with tactics, but it feels great to be back out there. It was quite a long summer break, so I really missed basketball, and we got back to work in great spirits,\u201d said Rytas veteran Gytis Masiulis.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"ng-star-inserted\"><span class=\"ng-star-inserted\">Rytas will spend the first phase of their pre-season in the capital, and at the end of the month, the team will traditionally travel to Druskininkai for an intensive training camp and another friendly match.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Rytas basketball players have officially turned the page to the new season. The capital&#8217;s club gathered for their first joint practice, where team veterans, newcomers, and youth system players all took to the floor. Head coach Nedas Pacevi\u010dius shared the team\u2019s initial working mood: \u201cThe mood is very good, truly. Today my first words to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9437,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9436","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-rytas"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Rytas begins preparations for the season: team veterans, newcomers, and youth system players in practice - Vilniaus \u201eRYTAS\u201c<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/rytasvilnius.lt\/en\/news\/rytas-begins-preparations-for-the-season-team-veterans-newcomers-and-youth-system-players-in-practice\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Rytas begins preparations for the season: team veterans, newcomers, and youth system players in practice - Vilniaus \u201eRYTAS\u201c\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Rytas basketball players have officially turned the page to the new season. The capital&#8217;s club gathered for their first joint practice, where team veterans, newcomers, and youth system players all took to the floor. Head coach Nedas Pacevi\u010dius shared the team\u2019s initial working mood: \u201cThe mood is very good, truly. Today my first words to [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/rytasvilnius.lt\/en\/news\/rytas-begins-preparations-for-the-season-team-veterans-newcomers-and-youth-system-players-in-practice\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Vilniaus \u201eRYTAS\u201c\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-08-25T16:55:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-08-25T17:04:55+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/rytasvilnius.lt\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2026\/08\/P1356118-1024x683.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1024\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"683\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/rytasvilnius.lt\/en\/news\/rytas-begins-preparations-for-the-season-team-veterans-newcomers-and-youth-system-players-in-practice\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/rytasvilnius.lt\/en\/news\/rytas-begins-preparations-for-the-season-team-veterans-newcomers-and-youth-system-players-in-practice\/\",\"name\":\"Rytas begins preparations for the season: team veterans, newcomers, and youth system players in practice - 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