pic credit: Fabian Heyn

Gabriel Jung (185-PG-2001) is a 25 year old 186cm guard that played the 2025-2026 season with the ETB Miners Essen (ProB) averaging 6.6ppg, 1.7rpg, 2.4apg, 1.0spg, FGP: 41.3%, 3PT: 29.4%, FT: 86.8% and helping the team win the 2026 Pro B title. He began his basketball career in the Phoenix Hagen organization playing NBBL and also with Regionalliga team Hagen-Haspe. He got his first Pro B experience with the VfL SparkassenStars Bochum (ProB) and also played with Regionalliga team Herten. He played with Regionalliga team BSV Wulfen from 2022-2025 playing a total of 82 games and averaged 12/3/3 stats in the 3 seasons. He spoke to germanhoops.com about the Pro B title season.

Thanks Gabriel for talking to germanhoops.com. Your 2026 Pro B champion. How good does it feel? Is this your personal biggest achievement as a player?

Definitely my biggest achievement as a player. Last time I came come this far I had a very limited role so to reach this goal and having a real impact on the court makes it much more satisfying.

Essen lost game 1 by 36 points and won game 2 by 41 points. Many are saying this is the greatest comeback in German basketball. How special do you rate this massive comeback?

It was massive especially on the mental side to not give up after the first game. I think many people where already satisfied by just getting the promotion and would have been fine with 2nd place. But the way we played the whole season I knew that no one on the team would be fine with the second place.

What was the team feeling after the horrible 107-71 loss at Orange Academy? How much soul searching did the team do the days following?

It was definitely a tough feeling getting dominated in that first game but we knew what we were capable of and just like after any other loss we just kept on working

How key was head coach Lars Wendt? How did he help the team most in the days leading up to game 2?

Headcoach Lars Wendt came up with our gameplan and we worked on it during the days leading to game 2 which ended up being successful and got us mentally ready for probably one of our biggest game

How quickly did the team know that game 2 would see only half of Orange Academy as all the talented youth players wouldn´t play because they were attending the NBBL Top 4 in Berlin?

We knew that there was the possibility of them being compromised by the NBBL Top 4 but we really knew when they showed up to the gym on Sunday

Any other team could have underestimated Orange Academy. Why didn´t Essen?

I think you can´t6 underestimate any team when you go into a game being down 36 points, we knew whatever squad would show up, we needed to play at our highest level

What was the focus of Essen going in? I mean did you have a plan how you would come back through out a 40 minute game so you would have more than 36 points?

It was the plan to create kind of a wild game, press a lot, run a lot and just come back quarter by quarter

The team began well and led 53-32 at the break. Essen was playing well offensively, but still had to do more on the defensive end. What wasn´t functioning as well so far on the defensive end through the first 20 minutes?

We gave up a couple of open layups when they beat our press and also got beat backdoor for easy buckets since we but a lot of pressure on the ball as well as off the ball, except for that I think we had a good first half defensively

What did head coach Lars Wendt give the team for advice at half-time?

We needed to stay patient and dont try to rush it. We were almost there but we knew and also didnt really expect to erase the lead at the end of the 3rd quarter. So just continuing step by step.

In the third quarter Orange Academy actually played well for the first few minutes outscoring Essen, but then came a 14-0 run by Essen which changed the game. You made drives and Ben Uzoma a big dunk. What was key in the run for Essen?

We started the 3rd quarter slowly which happend to us a couple of times during the season. But I think just hitting the switch, being more aggressive to the basket not necessarily settling for threes is what brought back the energy to the team and also to the crowd

Essen was up with 32 points with 10 minutes to play. Essen was in the drivers seat. Which player at this moment was a big motivator with words?

I think Marc Friederici was the one who found the right words in these kinds of situation during the whole season. He already played in the final the season before and has the experience to help the team

Essen began with a 10-2 run to lead 86-46. Now all Essen had to do was manage the lead to the buzzer. Essen then held Orange Academy minutes without scoring. Did you want it more than Orange Academy?

At that point in the season, having played already a lot of games and reaching the final both teams leave everything on the floor. I think it was also experience and having the crowd pushing you to go one step further was decisive.

Essen outscored Orange Academy 41-21 in the last half. Was this the best defense the team played in the season?

Yes, probably. Not even because we held them to 21 points, but also fighting every possession through every screen and for every ball

Essen held their 2 best scorers Joel Cwik and Namouri Omog to 8/28 shooting and 25 points. How much of a focus was the defense on slowing them down?

We had more of a team focused defense. At times we tried to take Cwik out of the game which worked more or less but we generally just tried to give nobody the space to feel comfortable.

Quarshawn Lane had an incredible 28/11/10 game. Did you sense going into the game that he could have a type of game of his life?

While Q had a big season anyways it was insane to see how he could just switch in to another gear in big moments so it was no surprise and i had no doubt he would deliver the way he did.

What was your fondest moment in the final in Essen against Orange Academy?

I couldn´t point out one moment it was just the whole gameday from the point of entering the gym, seeing the gym getting packed with a big crowd and having an incredible energy as a team

This was such a special season for the ETB Miners. Why was this team so special?

I think it just starts with the dedication everyone put in every single practice. While we did not have a certain target in mind we just worked hard every day to get better. And we had a great team chemistry which is really important

The team lost only 5 games during the regular season. Was their a game during the season where you then knew, we will win the whole thing?

No not really. Obviously as the season progesses your thinking about scenarios that could end up happening. But especially in the playoffs anything can happen so you got to stay humble and focused which we did

How vital was head coach Lars Wendt for the success? What was his biggest ability as a coach to be able to help bring success to the team?

The headcoach is always setting the tone from preseason on when the players are still getting to know each other which Lars did. And from there on he found a good balance of giving us strict instructions and just giving us the tools and letting the team create something on our own.

How special was it sharing the back court with Mychael Paulo? What part of his game will you always remember best?

Mychael was very vital for our team because he could create something out of nothing. And even though in some games he didn´t find the target from the beginning on, he could get hot really quick and start a run on his own.

How valuable was sniper guard Marc Friederici? What besides his scoring helped the team be successful?

As I said before Marc was very vocal during the whole season which, besides his game, made him very important for the team

How valuable were bigs Ben Uzoma and Niclas Sperber? What was each player´s biggest attribute for the success?

I mean Niclas was our captain and could share a lot of his experience with the younger guys. He his probably one of the most versatile players I played with and that was probably his biggest attribute. Whatever we needed from him, he could deliver.

With Ben it was just his pure strength and energy which gave us a mismatch in a lot of games on the big man position.

Which player was the most improved during the season?

I think Ben is the most improved player for us. From not having the summer he wanted to have due to injury and maybe having kind of a slow start, from there on he delivered every game with pure dominance.

Thanks Gabriel for the chat.