Enrico Cellini has gathered a few choice quotes from la Gazzetta’s interview with Nowitzki, including the German’s thoughts on his favorite Italian player, meeting Angela Merkel and topping Arvydas Sabonis.

On January 27, Dirk Nowitzki did not play for the Mavericks against the Minnesota Timberwolves but still brought home two interesting souvenirs from American Air Center. As you are reading BallinEurope, you don’t probably care too much about the diamond-encrusted $40K NBA championship ring (courtesy of Mark Cuban) that Dirk received in a touching ceremony (courtesy of Rick Carlisle), do you? Instead, what’s worth reporting about that night is the fact that Wunder Dirk also received the Europlayer 2011 award, an acknowledgement assigned by Italian Gazzetta dello Sport to the best European basketball player of the season.

You may see the ceremony here.

All right, so it wasn’t quite as dramatic as the ring ceremony but still …

Gazzetta dello Sport later published in its printed version an interview with Nowitzki, in which Würzburg’s finest touched on several topics.

Said Dirk on the loss in the 2005-06 NBA Finals to the Miami Heat: “That experience actually helped me – it made me improve: Now I handle the fourth quarter with more intelligence.”

However, Nowitzki then add that, for last year’s finals, he left his parents and his sister home because of that 2006 series: “They came in 2006 and it went badly: Too many distractions around. This time I wanted to stay focused. They really got mad at me. And now I regret such a choice!”

Asked which Italian NBA player he would like to have in his team, Nowitzki said, “Tough choice. Perhaps [Danilo] Gallinari, as he can play both small and power forward. He’s got a nice shot and the ability to draw fouls. But I like [Andrea] Bargnani, too – he’s improved a lot. He used to play only from the perimeter, and now he steps up.”

On his meeting with German chancellor Angela Merkel: “She’s nice, I spent half an hour with her, she asked me a lot of questions – even though she doesn’t know a lot about basketball!”

On his future, Dirk said that “I’ll play for at least two more years. Afterward, I’d like to stay in the basketball world. I see myself as a teacher to the kids, but I still don’t know if I’ll do it here in Texas or in Germany.”

Finally, he has no doubts on the next challenge: “This is my sixth Europlayer award, I want to get one more, beat [Arvydas] Sabonis and be no. 1 in [Gazetta della Sport’s all-time] rankings.”

Ricky Rubio, Los Gasoles, Gallinari and Bargnani: You have been warned.

Enrico Cellini is lifelong basketball fanatic and a long-time sportswriter with a focus on Italy and Spain. He was born among European hoops, was raised watching the NBA, and thinks choosing between American and European basketball is like choosing between one’s mother and father. You can follow him on Twitter or check out his Italian-language blog Hoop Addicted.

Kate Kevorken is playing her senior year with the University of Nevada, producing nicely for the Wolfpack after cracking the starting lineup in her second season with the program. The two guard bagged her first Western Athletic Conference player of the week award on December 19 thanks to a 25-point (including the game-winner), 11-rebound show against Oregon. Ten days later, “The Encyclopedia” broke her personal scoring mark with 27 points in a losing effort to Mississippi State.

Eastward, freshman Sarah Halejian’s game grows seemingly day to day with the Yale Bulldogs. Halejian went for her career-high 14 points in a 92-41 blowout win over St. Francis, sharing Ivy League Player of the Week honors for her efforts; she yesterday matched that scoring mark with another 14 in Yale’s 80-47 home win over Baruch.

Yale coach Chris Gobrecht has noted Halejian’s abilities as a “gifted offensive player,” stating that she’s “becoming a very strong defender as well” – and remember, folks, Yale awards no athletic scholarships, thus Halejian must be backing up her play with academic performance. The Bulldogs themselves currently occupy third place on the Ivy League table at 10-4.

As for this summer, Basketball Federation of Armenia president Hrachya Rostomyan is hopeful that Halejian and Kevorken can be infused into a team moving up on the European radar; Team Armenia placed second in the 2010 FIBA European Championship Women Division C tournament behind MVP Christina Kepenekian and all-tourney Amanda Jackson.

Said Rostomyan: “We look forward to Halejian and Kevorken possibly joining the women’s national basketball team in 2012. After our silver-medal performance [in 2010 ...] the potential impact of players like Sarah and Kate would be invaluable to Armenia.”

Alas, it was not to be. The Serbian sharpshooter will not be part of the Dallas Mavericks’ quest to repeat as NBA champions, announcing his retirement from professional basketball late Monday night. Citing injuries to his neck and back, Stojakovic decided his physical struggles were “a wakeup call” for him to leave the game at this point.

On the plus side, Peja has the privilege of going out on top, in 2011 not only topping his seeming long-time personal rivals the Los Angeles Lakers in the NBA playoffs, but also finally earning the ring which had eluded him for a dozen seasons ‘Stateside.

Today BallinEurope pays tribute to the gold-medal winning, NBA title having, future FIBA Hall of Fame nod achieving legend in the traditional fashion … let’s go to the ‘Tube!

• Stojakovic broke into the professional ranks with Crvena Zvedzda Beograd (a.k.a. Red Star Belgrade) at the age of 15 (!) and soon this once-dominant side enjoyed back-to-back Yugoslavian championships in taking out Partizan Belgrade in the finals both years.

• After three seasons of development (and plenty of bench time), Peja was ready to take on a more decisive role with a club. That club turned out to be PAOK; for his newly-prized Greek citizenship, Stojakovic would eventually bag the Greek League MVP nod in 1998.

Unfortunately for club and player, the sole hardware Peja’s PAOK teams could collect was the 1994-95 Greek Cup. On the other hand, in these four years PAOK did manage a second-place Europe finish in ’96 and in Greece in ’98 (losing to former Laker Byron Scott and Panathinaikos; see second video directly below) plus two Euroleague Top 16 runs: The team hasn’t come close to this sort of success since.

• And then the NBA came calling. Having been drafted at no. 14 in the 1996 NBA Draft, by 1998 Stojakovic felt ready to cross the Atlantic. He’d join up with the Sacramento Kings – the team with which he’ll always be associated worldwide – at a most fortuitous time, as the pieces to build a perpetual playoff contender were falling into place … and perhaps personally key for Peja was the acquisition of his Yugoslavian teammate Vlade Divac for 1999-2000.

• Speaking of Yugoslavia, Peja was happily able to enjoy success on perhaps the greatest national team of the ‘00s. Playing alongside the likes of Divac, Dejan Bodiroga, Marko Jaric, Dejan Milojevic and Vladimir Radmanovic, the side took the 2001 Eurobasket tournament and the 2002 FIBA World Championship.

On his part, Stojakovic was second-highest scorer in the 2001 competition (behind Team Germany’s Dirk Nowitzki) at 23 points per game, good for tournament MVP honors.

And in Indianapolis’ FIBA Worlds of 2002, Peja was again his team’s high scorer, still managing to help Yugoslavia over Argentina in the final match with 26 points despite uncharacteristic 2-of-12 shooting on threes. Stojakovic snagged an all-tournament nod for his efforts.

• Meanwhile, back with the Kings, Stojakovic worked his way into the starting lineup for 2000-01. Over the next five years, Peja would contribute lines 19.2-24.2 points and 4.3-6.3 rebounds per game while hitting enough three points to eventually place him at no. 4 on the all-time list in the statistical category.

• Though team-wise Sacramento had limited success from 2000 to 2005 in being forced to compete with Shaq ‘n’ Kobe’s Los Angeles monsters, the accolades for Stojakovic kept followed. He won back-to-back “Mister Europa” awards as Continental player of the year in 2001 and 2002 while receiving invites to three NBA All-Star games.

In fact, it was at the all-star games that perhaps Stojakovic earned the greatest amount of appreciation throughout the U.S., as he consistently became a Larry Bird-like force in the annual 3-point shootout competition. In 2001, Peja took current all-time threes leader Ray “He Got Game” Allen down to the wire, but ultimately had to settle for second place.

No matter, Peja came back in 2002 to take care of Steve Nash and outlast his personal foil in the contest, Wesley Person, to win the title…

…and again in 2003…

…ultimately falling short of the threepeat in 2004, but defying Charles Barkley’s prediction along the way, at least.

• One more highlight reel from the Sacramento days came in 2004, when Stojakovic set his then career-high mark in scoring with 37 points against the Lakers.

• But the Kings’ golden era was ending and in 2005, Peja was dealt to the Indiana Pacers for Ron Artest; he lasted 40 games there before a sign-and-trade agreement the following preseason had him shipped to the New Orleans/Oklahoma City Hornets for the rights to Andrew Betts (really).

Around this time, Peja’s well-chronicled back problems began. Due to injury, Stojakovic appeared in just 13 games in 2006-07; unfortunate, indeed, as Peja had given the Hornets a most masterful performance early on, scoring the team’s first 20 points in a November game against the Charlotte Bobcats. This was the first time in NBA history such a feat had been accomplished and Stojakovic’s 42 in the game became his personal high in scoring.

• Things really got percolating between Peja and Chris Paul over the next few years, as the Hornets made the playoffs in ’08 and ’09 (and just two years later, the league wants to contract this franchise – go figure). A representative example? Check out this team record-setting show in which Stojakovic sinks 10 three pointers against those dread Lakers in a game that saw Paul dish 21 assists.

• Another move would come for Peja after the Hornets’ poor 2009-10 and the Serb was shipped to the Toronto Raptors, thereby filling the apparent obligation for every European NBA player to do a shift in Canada. At the time, Stojakovic called the trade “a new chapter in [his] career, [his] life,” it wasn’t much of a read. Peja played just two games as a Raptor before landing in Dallas.

• We all recall what happened next. In a more limited role with the Mavericks, Stojakovic shot right at his career three-point success rate at 40% with a statistical line of 8.6 points and 2.6 rebounds per in 25 games there. Best of all, Peja was able to punish the Lakers along the way to his first NBA title with 15 and 21 points in games three and four, respectively, of the Western Conference semifinals – a nice capper to a legendary career.

BallinEurope wishes best of luck to Peja in the future and, as BiE always says upon retirement of an all-time great, thanks for the memories!

The process of elimination went the following way, in reverse order of finish, and garnishing with highlight clips.

10. Dimitris Diamantidis, Panathinaikos. Yes, Double-D was the Euroleague MVP and the Euroleague Final Four MVP for 2010-11. Yes, he thus established himself as one of the five or six greatest of the EL modern era. But Diamantidis did not play any international ball, whereas all other nine nominees participated in Eurobasket 2011 and most where instrumental to their team’s successes. Dimitris simply has the shortest CV of a very talented ten.

9. Dusko Savanovic, Power Electronics Valencia/Anadolu Efes/Team Serbia. Savanovic may not have even been the best player on an ultimately disappointing Serbian side that lost six of its last seven games to finish eighth in the Eurobasket tournament. (Nenad Krstic? Milos Teodosic, anyone…?) Savanovic seemed to get swamped with the tide as Serbia sank late, only managed to top 4-of-9 shooting twice in that seven-game stretch.

This is not to say that Savanovic can’t be clutch. After all, he live on forever in Valencia BC annals for the game-winning shot that put the Spanish side into the Euroleague Top 16…

8. Nicolas Batum, SLUC Nancy/Portland Trail Blazers/Team France. How old is this guy? What? He’ll be 23 on Wednesday? BiE guess we’ll have to call his 2010-11 NBA season (of 12.4 points, 4.5 rebounds, 1.5 assists per regular-season game) as his coming of age on the international stage, with the 2011 Eurobasket tournament and subsequent play with SLUC Nancy during the lockout the icing of that reputation. But even before his two Euroleague Player of the Week awards, Batum turned in one of the great clutch performances of 2011 for Les Bleus against Team Russia in the Eurobasket semifinal with his “all-action line of 19 points, 7 rebounds, 4 assists and 2 blocks.” BiE can’t believe we’re only up to number eight…

7. Marc Gasol, Memphis Grizzlies/Team Spain. Like Batum, Gasol The Younger will have a few more chances at winning this award – how about in, say, 2012, after a deep run by the surprising Memphis Grizzlies chased by a silver- (or gold-!) medal win by Los Rojos at the Olympics …? Marc did have one heck of a 2010-11, though, enjoying an all-star level performance in the regular season; a playoffs in which he averaged a 15.0/11.2 double-double while generally performing at a level diametrically opposed to that of his older sibling; and a nearly turbulent-free cruise through Eurobasket as he and brother Pau formed a twin-tower combination built for schooling young ‘uns like Enes Kanter. To paraphrase the governator, “he’ll be back.”

6. Pau Gasol, Los Angeles Lakers/Team Spain. You’d think that after starting at center in the NBA All-Star Game and leading one of the best national teams ever assembled in points and rebounds in Eurobasket would get Pau ranked higher, but the truth is that, fair, fortunate or not, for the 2010 FIBA Europe Player of the Year, 2011 will be remembered as the year in which he, ahem, “led” the Lakers’ ignominious collapse in the NBA playoffs. No way can he make this ballot, particularly with the suddenly reborn possibility that he could enter “disgruntled” status after landing with the Houston Rockets. And this has nothing to do with the fact that BiE is a Lakers fan. Well, not much.

5. Tony Parker, San Antonio Spurs/Asvel Basket/Team France. Tough elimination here … the last name to be definitively crossed off the list nevertheless had a year for the ages, turning in his usual solid season for the Spurs at 17.5 points, 6.6 assists and 3.1 rebounds per game. While Western Conference-winning San Antonio was bounced early, Parker contributed the second-most points (19.7 per game) and dished the most assists (5.2) for his team in six games of the first-round series.

All Parker did to “redeem” himself was write his and Team France’s way into the history books at Eurobasket 2011, leading the tournament in scoring, FG attempts, and FGs made. Given more weapons on a national team than ever before, Parker was nevertheless an indispensable force in getting Les Bleus to their first-ever Eurobasket final.

Parker capped the calendar year by becoming one of the first NBA players to announce a jump overseas; while proving utterly crucial to Asvel’s success in French League and Eurocup play, Parker may be creating something of a financial model for European basketball stars, particularly in times of labor troubles: That of the team executive/player.

Four names remain … now we come to the hard bit, so let’s dispense a couple of easy formalities first.

1. Dirk Nowitzki, Dallas Mavericks/Team Germany. Nowitzki last won this award in 2005, the first year of the award. Compared to that year, Dirk is down statistically in all major statistical categories from games played to free throw attempts to assists. But come on! Proving unstoppable in the 2011 NBA playoffs while simultaneously shrugging a big monkey off his back, entering “all-time greatest” conversations and dispatching the EEEEvil Miami Heat? Yep, Nowitzki wins.

2. Juan Carlos Navarro, FC Barcelona/Team Spain. Navarro is to European basketball as Nowitzki is to the NBA: Ever-reliable, always there to consistently produce for consistently winning teams. Though Barça suffered an early exit out of the Euroleague playoffs, the Blaugrana nevertheless took the ACB title – with Navarro named tournament MVP. Team Spain of course took gold at Eurobasket 2011 … with Navarro named tournament MVP. Just for good measure, La Bomba helped Barca to the Spanish Cup … and was named tournament MVP, has led his team to a 17-1 overall run to start 2010-11, and just became the modern-era Euroleague career scoring leader. A pretty good year.

And so they meet yet again to decide the final spot on the BallinEurope ballot: It’s down to Andrei Kirilenko and Bo McCalebb.

Regarding Kirilenko, forget his season with the Utah Jazz (even though his stat line was a respectable 11.7 points, 5.1 rebounds and 3.0 assists in a turbulent year for the team); if we’re talking *European* Player of the Year, just consider what the AK-47 did on The Continent in 2011. As the oldest player on a decidedly more up-tempo Team Russia than he’s used to, Kirilenko was nevertheless a monster at Eurobasket 2011, leading the third-place finishers in scoring, offensive rebounds and total rebounds; plus, his 29 steals was best of the tournament.

But it was with CSKA Moscow that Kirilenko really demonstrated his brilliance and abilities as a model European player. After arriving about 14 minutes before the season began, Kirilenko was thrice named Player of the Week in six weeks of Euroleague play, sometimes killing with shooting, sometimes crashing the boards, sometimes doing it through intangibles. From a purely selfish perspective, one of the worst outcomes of the NBA lockout settlement is the departure of the most dominant performer we’ve recently seen in Europe’s biggest league.

Finally, what about Bo? BallinEurope can feel the shudders all across The Continent in reaction to this nomination. Seriously, a New Orleanian who’d barely stepped foot in FYR Macedonia suddenly becoming a citizen of that country and subsequently gaining eligibility to awards like such as this? McCalebb’s new passport was quite the subject of debate among the Eurobasket press corps, let BiE tell ya.

Put the micro-geopolitics aside momentarily, though, and consider the kind of ball Bo brought to Europe in 2010-11. After a Euroleague season in which McCalebb led a youthful Partizan Belgrade to a shocking Final Four finish, Bo moved to Italy and, despite a knee injury, returned to the tournament to help Montepaschi Siena land a third-place finish. He’s already adding to his personal highlight clip this year as well with a 23-point show against Unics Kazan a couple weeks ago.

And then there was the biggest surprise and perhaps even the single biggest story (competing only with Spain’s dominance and France’s first-ever finals appearance) of Eurobasket 2011: Team FYR Macedonia. McCalebb fearlessly and meticulously led his equally fearless and meticulous national team to mouse-that-roared status at the European tournament. With the point guard position given such exaggerated importance at tourneys of this ilk, McCalebb added an exciting cutting-and-slashing dimension throughout Eurobasket, consistently drawing attention while contributing to the best side in terms of ball protection and turnover differential in the competition.

As awesome as Navarro and Pau Gasol were, as brilliant a field general as Parker was, no Eurobasket team – and perhaps no European team on any level in 2010-11 – so depended on a single player as did the 2012 Olympic qualifiers FYR Macedonia.

So, how about it? Who gets the no. 3 spot on BallinEurope’s ballot? Good thing that BiE has until January to figure this out…

Okay, so BallinEurope wouldn’t go that far; after all, we’re talking about a player of retired-jersey status here. Regardless, Beşiktaş Milangaz began the post-Deron Williams Era with a 77-75 win at Armia in FIBA Eurochallenge play, thanks to a David Hawkins jumper in the waning seconds…

Official FIBA writeup follows.

(FIBA Europe) – Beşiktaş Milangaz completed a two-game sweep of Armia on Tuesday to clinch first place in EuroChallenge Group B, as David Hawkins hit a jump shot one second before the end to lift Beşiktaş to a 77-75 win in Tbilisi.

Armia were able to get the ball to recent signing Matthew Freije before time expired but his three-pointer was off target.

Jeremy Richardson nearly lifted Armia to victory. After Hawkins’ two free throws with 1:16 remaining, Richardson caught a pass from new Armia guard Ben Woodside and drilled a jump shot to knot the game at 73-73.

Hawkins dunked with 40 seconds to go to put the visitors back in front, only for Richardson, after an Armia timeout, to reply with a jumper. Beşiktaş ran the clock down to 10 seconds and then called a timeout. When play resumed, Hawkins got the ball in his hands and hit the game-winning shot.

Beşiktaş outscored Armia 27-19 in the last quarter.

The EuroChallenge Player of the Week in the last round, Erwin Dudley (a.k.a. Ersin Dagli), will contend for that honor again as he had 18 points and 13 rebounds for Beşiktaş. Hawkins finished with 17 points and Serhat Cetin contributed 16.

Zoran Erceg also had a strong game with 12 points, six rebounds and three assists for Beşiktaş; his biggest shot came with 1:45 to go, a three-ball that tied the contest at 71-71.

Joakim Kjellbom scored 17 points and corralled 13 rebounds for Armia, and Will Thomas had 15 points and eight boards. Richardson also had 15 points and Woodside 13, along with seven assists.

With the win, the Turkish club improved to 5-0 and Armia fell to 3-2. Should ZZ Leiden prevail in their game against BG Göttingen Wednesday, the Dutch side will host a decisive clash with Armia next week to determine the second-place team in Group B. Armia won their encounter on November 22, 74-71, so Leiden would be aiming for a win of four points or more to claim the second spot.

[Update: Talk Basket is running a list of all players with point totals of 36 or more in a Eurochallenge game since the league was formed in 2003. As it turns out, the all-time high to this point was 39, a mark shared by Fernando San Emeterio, then of CB Girona, and Svendborg Rabbits' Johnell Smith. Williams has, no matter how the NBA lockout turns out, left a mark on European basketball that will remain for quite some time, it seems.]

Göttingen simply had no answers for the New Jersey Net, allowing him to go 17-of-23 from the floor, including a 7-of-10 performance on three-pointers; stated the German side’s coach Stefan Mienack in the post-game: “We played against one of the elite teams of Europe. They’re absolute contenders for the title and they have great players. It’s so hard to win agaınst a team in which Deron Wıllıams plays for.”

Check out the video below for a highlight clip stuff with Williams’ relentless attacking; the Violets’ backcourt of Dale Lewis, Kyle Bailey, Paris Horne et al will certainly be suffering nightmares for months. Official FIBA writeup follows the clip.

(FIBA Europe) – Deron Williams exploded for 50 points on Tuesday in Istanbul and Besiktas Milangaz needed every one of them in a 105-94 EuroChallenge victory over BG Göttingen.

The point guard, one of the first NBA players to move to Europe during the NBA lockout, made 17 of his 23 shots from the floor. Included in that were seven of 10 makes from three-point range.

Göttingen, who have been struggling this season, trailed 91-90 after their 23-year-old point guard Louis Dale buried a shot from the arc with 2:14 to go.

Williams went to the other end, though, and with the 24-shot clock winding down answered with a three-pointer. Then with Besiktas on top 95-90 and 1:10 remaining, Williams struck again from the arc before going in for a layup on his team’s next possession for a 100-90 lead.

The USA Olympic gold medal winner reached the 50-point plateau with a layup on a fast break just 13 seconds from the end.

The most points ever scored by Williams in the NBA came in a 2010 when he played for the Utah Jazz against the Oklahoma City Thunder and poured in 42.

David Hawkins finished with 23 points for Besiktas, who improved to 3-0 in Eurochallenge Group B.
Raymond Sykes led the Violets with 25 points and Kyle Bailey had 19. The German club fell to 0-3 with the defeat.

While Divac may be known as a famous trivia answer (“Who was traded for Kobe Bryant?”) or by the dreaded “F-word” (i.e. “flopper” as used in – really – this Los Angeles Times blog entry detailing the story of Vlade’s honor), this nomination shows a lifetime of accomplishment on the basketball court. Heck, in the NBA alone, Divac topped 13,000 points, 9000 rebounds, 3000 assists and 1500 blocked shots over 16 seasons. And then there were those “Dream Team” years with Team Yugoslavia and the glorious early days with KK Partizan in the 1980s, highlighted by Korać Cup titles and Divac’s “Mr. Europa” trophy.

Today, BallinEurope pays tribute to a personal favorite on the occasion in the best way possible: With a YouTube-laden rundown of his long and memorable career! Check out Divac’s progress through turns with Partizan Belgrade, the Los Angeles Lakers, Sacramento Kings, the “Dream Team” Yugoslavian squads, and of course KK Crvena Zvezda during the 1999 NBA player lockout…

• Divac broke into the professional level at 18 years old with KK Sloga Kraljevo and early on contributed 27 points in a game against Crvena Zvezda. At this time, Divac first played with the Yugoslavian national team, ultimately to become an integral part of those monstrous Team Yugoslavia sides which would also feature the likes of Drazen Petrovic, Toni Kukoc and Dino Radja.

• From 1986 through 1989, Divac was with KK Partizan. Teaming with players such as Aleksandar Đorđević, Žarko Paspalj, Željko Obradović, Milenko Savović and Goran Grbović, coach Duško Vujošević’s teams carved a spot among the top teams on the Continent. In these years, Partizan took three Korać Cups, including one over Kukoc’s Euroleague champion KK Split team; won one Yugoslavian national title and one Yugoslavian Cup; and finished third in 1988 in Euroleague, the same year Divac was named European Player of the Year by FIBA.

Below runs some rare footage of the 1988 and ’89 Yugoslavian finals – yep, sonny, we once recorded TV on this device called the VCR…

• Just for the heck of it, here’s a profile piece on Divac from Belgrade news and thus in Serbian only. Well worth a brief view for at least the awesome retro look and the oddity of seeing Divac *that young.*

(Incidentally, if any Serbian-speakers can tell us about anything being discussed in this clip, BallinEurope would much appreciate it.)

• Having enjoyed three years in international play, Divac would amass Olympic silver, plus EuroBasket gold and bronze medals before even suiting up for the Los Angeles Lakers at the age of 23 in 1989.

• Despite what some informal revisionists might have you think, Lakers fans weren’t exactly 100% unanimous in confidence in their new foreign player – particularly with the act Divac had to follow – in those days when Europeans comprised a tiny fraction of NBA rosters. On a personal note, this Laker fan distinctly remembers (still!) the line from one beat writer in the preseason which ran, “Going from Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is like trading in a Cadillac for a Yugo.”

Nevertheless, Divac soon stilled the haters (What term did we use back then? “Detractors,” maybe?) in compiling some decent stats in his rookie season with Pat Reilly’s guys, going for 8.5 points, 6.2 rebounds and 1.4 blocks in 19.6 minutes per game. Though almost never in the starting lineup, Divac appeared in all 82 games and displayed an awesome skill set.

• Unfortunately (and somewhat ironically) for him, Divac’s sole appearance in the NBA Finals would come in his first as a starter. Of course, that 1990-91 Lakers team was dismantled by the insurgent Chicago Bulls, losing four games to one. And when Magic bowed out of basketball in November of ’91, Los Angeles would not become a force in the league again until … well, we’ll get to that.

• Meanwhile, geopolitics was happening. Team Yugoslavia finally hit its peak in the years 1989 to ’91, sandwiching EuroBasket titles with the huge gold-medal win at the 1990 FIBA World Championship; Divac’s controversial interaction with a Croatian fan immediately following the final game triggered the events documented most extensively and excellently documented in the ESPN-produced “Once Brothers.”

Due to civil war, Team Yugoslavia no longer existed as before in 1992, but Divac would stay with the team for years to come…

• Back in the NBA, Divac’s most fateful day came in 1996 when he was traded by the Lakers to the Charlotte Hornets for the draft rights to Kobe Bryant – also implying that Los Angeles would also soon be signing the free-agent prize that offseason, Shaquille O’Neal …

• By the way, all this stuff about NBA players in Europe during a lockout is nothing new: Divac played two games with KK Crvena Zvezda in 1999…

• In a way, the exit from the Lakers would ultimately be both a blessing in disguise and his career’s biggest frustration. After two years playing out his contract in Charlotte, Divac joined the Sacramento Kings of Chris Webber and Peja Stojakovic. The teams would form quite the feud while the Lakers were winning titles in the 2000s, though the Kings could never quite top their California rivals in the playoffs.

• The frustration may be best encapsulated by – look away now, Sacramento fans! – that game-winning shot by Robert Horry in game four of the 2002 Western Conference finals. Said Vlade, “It was a lucky shot.” Retorted Horry: “I don’t know, maybe he said read a ‘paper or something.”

• Still with the national team at the turn of the millennium, Divac was now with a Team Yugoslavia drawing on a smaller pool of talent but almost as preeminent in international ball in the early 2000s. BiE sticks by his assessment of the 2001-02 Teams Yugoslavia as the top European national team of that decade: “In 2002, the Yugoslavian team slammed the door on American preeminence in basketball forever. And this was after breezing through Eurobasket 2001, winning five of six games by double-digit margins. Yugoslavia was the only country to take golds at Eurobasket and FIBA World competitions with (basically) the same team; the 2002 roster included Dejan Bodiroga, Peja Stojakovic, Marko Jaric, Dejan Milojevic, Vlade Divac and Vladimir Radmanovic, a roster good enough to merit mention among a discussion of greatest basketball teams ever assembled, period.”

• Returning to the Lakers for 2004-05 in largely a ceremonial capacity, Divac retired at the end of that season, but the accolades continued. He’s in the FIBA Hall of Fame and on the 50 Greatest Euroleague Contributors list; in 2009, he was named Serbia Olympic Committee president. And naturally the Kings retired his jersey.

As for the “flopping” thing, well, the video directly below shows he’s got a sense of humor about things. A Hall of Fame-level sense of humor, perhaps … we’ll have to wait until February to hear if Divac enters the hallowed halls in Springfield, but until then, BiE thanks him for the memories.

Despite it all, suggests Tom Schad in the Copenhagen Post Online, “Denmark could become world beaters in basketball.” Citing the examples of Tony Parker, Dirk Nowitzki and Yao Ming, Schad argues that it only takes “one great player to give a country hope” in its national basketball program, and “For Denmark, maybe that player is about to arrive.”

That would be Anton Larsen, currently with Old Dominion University.

It’s a compelling argument, as basketball allows one outstanding player to carry a team through a tournament single-handedly – and Spain can be added to the list of countries that came from seemingly out of nowhere to become a perpetual powerhouse in the modern era.

On the other hand, if Larsen’s the centerpiece, wellllllll … time will tell, one supposes.

The seven-footer played sparingly in Saturday’s 63-46 loss to Northern Iowa (!), going just 0-of-1 from the floor in seven minutes. Last year, as a sophomore, Larsen played in 12 games last season, with season totals of 15 points and nine rebounds in 36 minutes.

Another potential problem: Larsen is 23 years old; at his age, Nowitzki had already played three years of NBA ball and was the top scorer in EuroBasket 2001. Parker wore two NBA championship rings (!!!) and one EuroBasket bronze medal. The Monarch is a bit behind the curve here, but presumably we’ll be seeing him with Team Denmark in FIBA Europe’s Division B play in 2013.

So call Larsen, like Danish basketball (particularly the U18s, whom Schad notes “finished second and are now considered one of the best young squads in Europe. Teen phenoms Rasmus Glarbjerg and Esben Reinholt will be particularly interesting to watch”), a work in progress. It’s good that they’re keeping the faith up there…

The CV of the player in question includes turns on the gold-medal Team USA of the FIBA Americas U18 Championship in addition to performances in the Nike Hoop Summit, the McDonald’s All-American Game, and the Jordan Brand Classic – all in 2010. Beyond these, he’s got about a half-season with Duke University under his belt with a stat line including 17.4 points and 5.1 assists per game.

We’re talking about no less than Australian-American Kyrie Irving here, the no. 1 overall pick in the NBA Draft currently on lockout and getting frustrated. Today, on yet another day of reckoning for labor relations in the big league, the former Blue Devil tweeted:

“if a deal doesn’t get done soon … overseas here i come”

Well, we’ll welcome you, Kyrie. And, just to get things started, BiE understands Virtus Bologna may have some money to throw around…

Yesterday, FIBA was forced to do a bizarre bit of damage control after Lithuanian media – specifically, who else but powerhouse club sponsor Lietuvos Rytas? – reported that two players competing in EuroBasket had tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs; the piece quoted representatives from the Lithuanian Anti-Doping Agency stated abnormalities had been found and that further testing would have to be done by FIBA on the samples of the two players.

FIBA Europe was quick to deny any such claims, however, soon releasing the following tersely-worded statement on the subject:

“FIBA Europe has dismissed media speculations which claim that two of the players participating in the recent EuroBasket in Lithuania returned a positive drug test.

“FIBA Europe has emphasized that any such news reports are without substance.

“FIBA Europe would have been the first to be informed about positive tests for banned substances during EuroBasket 2011, a tournament that has already been trademarked as one of the best and cleanest basketball events ever.

“On Tuesday, news reports sourcing in Lithuania and reproduced around Europe, were referring to two players who have been tested positive for banned performance enhancing substances during the EuroBasket.”

The lifespan of this rumor through the 21st-century hype cycle – from half-baked rumor to re-reportage online as fact to official denial to tapering off of tweets – with the speed of a fruitfly, and in the squall of commentary at least one Macedonian media outlet took quite the aggressive stance toward their Lithuanian counterparts.

In an English-language piece entitled “Lithuanian Media Still Upset over loss to Macedonia,” an unidentified Macedonian International News Agency (MINA) writer reinterpreted the gossip proliferation of yesterday somewhat freely.

The MINA piece, together with snarky comments provided by BallinEurope, follows.

“Lithuanian media, the same media who predicted their nation reaching the final, even printed tickets for the Spain match before their team even played Macedonia, is now claiming there were two basketball players using Steroids during the European championship in Basketball.”

(Wait a minute, Lithuanian media printed tickets?)

“Some people it seems, just can’t take a loss…”

(Oooh, zing.)

“The Lithuanian basketball federation had said nothing, but the media today claimed ‘for sure’ there were two basketball players using steroids. First it was two Macedonians, then [they] corrected themselves and now [it’s] one Macedonian and one Spaniard. Though frankly, Macedonians did request a doping test for Navarro (who couldn’t miss) as well as for the Greek referee who had 92% of his calls go against Macedonia.”

(BiE thinks that last part is meant to be ironic; either that or some people just can’t take a win.)

“FIBA issued a quick press release slamming the Lithuanian media for their speculative reporting because the international body had conducted numerous tests and all came back negative. FIBA went even as far as to say that was the ‘cleanest’ tournament ever.”

(Read the FIBA Europe statement, “…any such news reports are without substance.” Wait a minute … is that a play on words?)

“FIBA on its website refused to speculate which national teams or players the Lithuanian media referred to!”

(Perhaps because they’ve put the matter of Navarro and Bo McCalebb’s seemingly supernatural powers in the tournament into an X-file … incidentally, who ends a news story with an exclamation point?)

BiE believes the best solution in order to prevent a war of words between Macedonian and Lithuanian media/blogophiles would be to get them on the court. In such a venue, certain trash-talking might be more appropriate.

And gee, does BiE hope that the Luol Deng-to-Bizkaia Bilbao Basket story published on Krepsinis.net isn’t “without substance” as well!