MIRSAD TURKCAN - 101 Greats of European Basketball
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
Mirsad<br />
Turkcan<br />
371
The king <strong>of</strong><br />
rebounds<br />
I<br />
met Mirsad Turkcan in December <strong>of</strong> 1994 when I<br />
went by the Calderon Hotel in Barcelona to write a<br />
preview for the newspaper I was working for at the<br />
time, Mundo Deportivo, for that week’s EuroLeague<br />
game between FC Barcelona and Efes Pilsen.<br />
I got there with the newspaper in my hands. While I<br />
was in reception, I was talking to Efes coach Aydin Ors<br />
and a young player from the Turkish team asked me,<br />
in English, if he could have a look at the paper. Right<br />
away, I heard a comment from him in pure Serbian.<br />
He was Mirsad Turkcan, a young talent <strong>of</strong> Efes Pilsen,<br />
who was already known in the basketball circles due<br />
to his 16.6-point average at the FIBA <strong>European</strong> Championship<br />
for Junior Men, played the previous summer<br />
in Tel Aviv. Until then, I never had the chance to meet<br />
him because in 1992, his getaway to Istanbul from Novi<br />
Pazar, the Serbian city where he was born on June 7,<br />
1976, happened at almost the same time as mine to<br />
Barcelona. Turkcan was born under the name Jahovic<br />
in a rather well-known family <strong>of</strong> doctors in Novi Pazar,<br />
the main city in the region <strong>of</strong> Sandzak, with a majority<br />
Muslim population. One <strong>of</strong> his sisters follows the family<br />
tradition and is a doctor in Belgrade, while the other,<br />
Emina, is a well-known singer both in Serbia and Turkey,<br />
where she lives with her husband, the famous Turkish<br />
singer Mustafa Sandal.<br />
Mirsad’s thing was neither medicine nor music.<br />
His destiny was in sports, specifically, basketball. As a<br />
young talent, he was a candidate to play for all the big<br />
teams in Yugoslavia. The fastest one to catch him was<br />
Bosna, and young Mirsad ended up in Sarajevo. However,<br />
in the spring <strong>of</strong> 1992, with the coming war in sight,<br />
the Efes Pilsen scouts convinced his family to let him relocate<br />
to Istanbul. So Mirsad Jahovic, who would soon<br />
have a Turkish passport and the name Turkcan, started<br />
his great adventure on the Bosphorus. Between 1992<br />
and 2012, the year when he retired, many things happened.<br />
Triumph in the Korac Cup<br />
Mirsad Turkcan’s career didn’t develop at lightning<br />
speed. It went step by step, improving season after<br />
season. From the very start <strong>of</strong> his career, his main<br />
weapon was rebounds. Standing at 2.06 meters, his<br />
height didn’t precisely stand out for a basketball player,<br />
but his jumping capabilities together with great timing<br />
gave him, I’d say, 10 centimeters more. He usually won<br />
rebounding duels with players much bigger than him. In<br />
that 1994-95 season, his first on the senior team at Efes,<br />
his numbers in 12 EuroLeague games were discreet,<br />
2.2 points and 1.7 rebounds in 5.7 minutes on the floor.<br />
In the summer <strong>of</strong> 1995, he made his debut in the<br />
Turkish national team at the 1995 EuroBasket in Athens.<br />
With 8.3 points and 7.5 rebounds, he was one <strong>of</strong><br />
the young prospects that stood out the most.<br />
In the 1995-96 season, Turkcan was already a staple<br />
on the competitive Efes Pilsen team, which played the<br />
Korac Cup. Petar Naumoski, Ufuk Sarica, Conrad McRae,<br />
Volkan Aydin, Tamer Oyguc, Murat Evliyaoglu, Turkcan<br />
and the rest built a great team that, on its way to the<br />
title game, had beaten several strong opponents, like<br />
Maccabi Rishon, Varese, Panionios, Fenerbahce and<br />
Fortitudo Bologna. The opponent in the final would<br />
be Olimpia Milano, which really was Stefanel Trieste<br />
<strong>101</strong> greats <strong>of</strong> european basketball<br />
Mirsad Turkcan<br />
T
Vladimir Stankovic<br />
relocated to Milan, a team with Dejan Bodiroga, Nando<br />
Gentile, Rolando Blackman and Gregor Fucka. Milano’s<br />
coach was Bogdan Tanjevic, who would be a future<br />
coach <strong>of</strong> Turkcan’s with the Turkish national team and<br />
Fenerbahce. The Italian team was the favorite, but Efes<br />
won their first duel, played in Istanbul on March 6, 1996,<br />
by the score <strong>of</strong> 76-68. The hero <strong>of</strong> the game was guard<br />
Naumoski, who scored 31 points. Mirsad contributed<br />
6 points and 6 boards. The eight-point difference gave<br />
hope to both teams, but the Italians ended up losing<br />
their third straight final in that competition. After PAOK<br />
and ALBA, the executioner this time was Efes. In Milan,<br />
Olimpia’s 77-70 win was not enough. Naumoski was the<br />
top scorer again with 26 points, and Turkcan added 7<br />
points and 13 rebounds. It was the <strong>European</strong> trophy<br />
ever lifted by a Turkish team.<br />
First Turk in the NBA<br />
In 1997, at only 21 years old, Mirsad Turkcan was<br />
already a future star and a coveted player. At the U22<br />
World Championship for Men that year, he shined with<br />
17.7 points and 10.7 rebounds, and at the 1997 Euro-<br />
Basket, he helped Turkey reach eighth place. In 1998, he<br />
finished the season as the best rebounder in the Turkish<br />
League and nobody was surprised when the Houston<br />
Rockets chose him with the 18th pick in that year’s NBA<br />
draft. Turkcan would become the first Turkish player in<br />
the NBA. Due to the lockout, he remained at Efes for<br />
a while, but when the NBA season finally started, he<br />
was traded to the Philadelphia 76ers and then to the<br />
New York Knicks. After seven games in New York, he<br />
was traded yet again to the Milwaukee Bucks, where he<br />
played 10 more games. His average was 5.3 minutes,<br />
only enough for 1.9 points and 1.9 rebounds per game.<br />
With his height, solid shooting and especially, his great<br />
rebounding capabilities, Turkcan almost had a perfect<br />
pr<strong>of</strong>ile for the NBA, where physical aspects are important.<br />
But the coaches just didn’t trust him. Disappointed,<br />
he decided to go back to Europe.<br />
Turkcan started the 2000-01 season again at Efes<br />
Pilsen, but he ended up with Racing Paris, where<br />
his 15.9 points and 8.4 rebounds in 14 games were<br />
enough for CSKA Moscow to call him for the start <strong>of</strong><br />
a big project that had one goal: winning the EuroLeague.<br />
However, before moving to Moscow he had to<br />
take part in another historic event for Turkish basketball.<br />
At the 2001 EuroBasket in Turkey, the hosts<br />
reached the title game where they lost to Yugoslavia,<br />
led by Bodiroga and Predrag Stojakovic. However,<br />
the silver for Turkey was its first medal in continental<br />
competitions. Together with Ibrahim Kutluay, Hidayet<br />
Turkoglu, Mehmed Okur, Harun Erdenay, Kerem Tunceri,<br />
Kaya Peker, Huseyin Besok, Omer Onan, Orhun<br />
Ene and Asim Pars, Turkcan made the history books.<br />
With 10.7 points, he was the fourth-best scorer on<br />
the team, and with 8.3 boards, the second-best rebounder.<br />
In its first try, CSKA didn’t manage to reach the Bologna<br />
Final Four in 2002. The team finished third in the<br />
Top 16 with a 3-3 record, right behind Maccabi Tel Aviv<br />
(4-2) and Tau Ceramica (4-2). With 16.2 points and 10.7<br />
rebounds, Turkcan was one <strong>of</strong> the best players on his<br />
team. The following season he played at Montepaschi<br />
Siena <strong>of</strong> Italy. The team did reach the Final Four in Barcelona<br />
but fell to Benetton Treviso in the semis by a close<br />
65-62 score. It was, probably, the worst day as a pro for<br />
Turkcan. In 29 minutes he didn’t score a single point, after<br />
having averaged 14.8 that season, and he grabbed<br />
just 5 rebounds, way below his season 11.8 per game<br />
until then. In the game for third place, he collected his<br />
372<br />
373
usual double-double again, 16 points and 14 rebounds,<br />
but it was already too late. The title game would feature<br />
Benetton and FC Barcelona.<br />
In the 2003-04 season Turkcan was back to CS-<br />
KA and he was again in the Final Four, this time in Tel<br />
Aviv, but again, he missed out on the title game. In the<br />
semis, Maccabi got the best <strong>of</strong> CSKA with a 93-85 win<br />
as Anthony Parker (27 points) and Sarunas Jasikevicius<br />
(18) led the way to victory. On the other side, Marcus<br />
Brown scored 23, J.R. Holden contributed 16 points<br />
and Turkcan picked up 10 points plus 10 boards. After<br />
the season, he stayed in Moscow but switched teams<br />
to Dynamo for one year before returning to Istanbul,<br />
first to Ulker and later to Fenerbahce in 2006-07 until,<br />
finally, both clubs merged into what today we know as<br />
Fenerbahce Dogus Istanbul.<br />
Euroleague <strong>Basketball</strong> Legend<br />
Lacking collective titles with his teams, Turkcan<br />
received many individual accolades. He was MVP <strong>of</strong><br />
the 2002 regular season in the EuroLeague. He was<br />
also MVP <strong>of</strong> the round six times in 2002-03, the Top<br />
16 MVP in 2003 and a member <strong>of</strong> the All-EuroLeague<br />
teams in 2002, 2003 and 2004. His career highs in the<br />
EuroLeague are a performance index rating <strong>of</strong> 43, with<br />
Montepaschi against Panathinaikos, and 27 points and<br />
23 rebounds with CSKA against Buducnost. He had<br />
49 double-doubles in the EuroLeague – still a record –<br />
but that 27+23 performance has a special place in the<br />
history <strong>of</strong> the competition. In 129 EuroLeague games,<br />
he grabbed 1,287 rebounds, which still ranks fourth<br />
all-time, behind only players with at least double his<br />
amount <strong>of</strong> games in the competition. Still, Turkcan’s<br />
9.95 rebounds per game is the second-highest career<br />
average and the highest for anyone with more than 65<br />
EuroLeague games played.<br />
In February 2011, Turkcan suffered a severe ACL<br />
injury and in 2012 he announced his retirement. On<br />
September 16 <strong>of</strong> that year, Fenerbahce and CSKA Moscow<br />
played a friendly game on the day <strong>of</strong> his <strong>of</strong>ficial<br />
goodbye. That day there was only one winner, Mirsad<br />
Turkcan. Five years later, 2017 brought more recognition<br />
for Turkcan as he was named an <strong>of</strong>ficial Euroleague<br />
<strong>Basketball</strong> Legend during the semifinals at the Final<br />
Four in Istanbul. Two nights later, he was among the<br />
many who celebrated when Fenerbahce became the<br />
first Turkish club ever to with continental title, completing<br />
a path that Mirsad Turkcan, the king <strong>of</strong> rebounds,<br />
helped to build.<br />
<strong>101</strong> greats <strong>of</strong> european basketball<br />
Mirsad Turkcan<br />
T