OLEKSANDR VOLKOV - 101 Greats of European Basketball

Oleksandr
Volkov
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The symbol
of Ukrainian
basketball
Oleksandr Volkov was born in Omsk,
in present-day Russia, on March 29,
1964, but he started playing in Kiev,
the capital of Ukraine, and after
the breakup of the USSR he chose
Ukraine as his home country.
In Ukrainian, his name is spelled with an “o” at the
beginning – Oleksandr – but in many documents and
sources he is referred to as Aleksandr, Aleksander, Alexander
or Aleksandar. However, everybody knows him
by the nickname Sasha. With his surname, there are no
problems or different versions. The root of the word in
Russian and several Slavic languages is “volk”, which
translates into “wolf”. In some ways, Volkov was indeed
a wolf around the basket: tall, proud, strong, aggressive
and always with a hunger ... for a win.
Pioneer in the NBA
Sasha Volkov was one of the few European players
who, at the end of the 1980s, opened a new page in the
NBA and, in some ways, in the history of basketball in
general. When Bulgarian Georgi Glouchkov – the first
European ever in the NBA – Spaniard Fernando Martin,
Lithuanian Sarunas Marciulionis, Croatian Drazen Petrovic,
and Serbians Vlade Divac and Zarko Paspalj landed
in the NBA, they had to overcome many obstacles, most
of all a total lack of trust from American head coaches.
Until then, the NBA had just two European players
with important roles, but both had been to American
colleges: Detlef Schrempf of Germany and Rik Smits
of the Netherlands. Thanks to these players the NBA
doors are today open to many talented players.
Before making history in the NBA, Volkov earned
prestige and respect in Europe. To the international
eyes, he made his national team debut at the second
FIBA U19 Basketball World Cup in 1983 in Palma de Mallorca,
Spain. The USSR lost the title game to the United
States 82-78. Volkov scored 4 points in that final, while
his tournament average was 6.1 points. Two years later,
Volkov made his senior national team debut at the 1985
EuroBasket in Stuttgart, Germany. He was part of a
great USSR team with Arvydas Sabonis, Valdis Valters,
Marciulionis, Valeri Tikhonenko, Rimas Kurtinaitis, Aleksandar
Belostenny, Sergejus Jovaisa, Vladimir Tkatchenko,
Sergei Tarakanov and Andrey Lopatov. Almost
the same team would triumph at the 1988 Olympics in
Seoul three years later. Volkov’s average at EuroBasket
in 1985 was 7.8 points, well short of the 20 per game by
Sabonis, 16.4 by Valters or 15.5 by Kurtinaitis, but he
was a key part of a group that was crowned European
champion. Indeed, in beating Czechoslovakia 120-89 in
the final, Volkov played 29 minutes, scored 18 points
and grabbed 12 rebounds. Only three players scored
more than him: Valters (27), Kurtinaitis (24) and Sabonis
(20 plus 15 boards). But Volkov, at age 21, was
already an important player on the team, an ideal power
forward to cover the space between the backcourt
players and the towering Sabonis.
Those days were the start of great friendships among
players of several nationalities of the former USSR. The
team was formed by Lithuanians, Russians, Ukrainians
and Latvians who, not much later, would play for their
Oleksandr Volkov
101 greats of european basketball
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Vladimir Stankovic
own countries. But the disintegration of a former country
could not destroy the bond among those players, forged
on the court while defending the same jersey.
One year later, with almost the same team at the
1986 World Cup in Spain, the USSR lost the title game
87-85 to the United States, led by Kenny Smith and
David Robinson, with 23 points each. In 30 minutes,
Volkov scored 8 points, a little below his average in the
tourney (11.2). That same year, Volkov was picked in the
NBA draft’s sixth round by the Atlanta Hawks. A year
later, at the 1987 EuroBasket in Athens, Volkov and the
USSR lost the title to Greece 103-101 in overtime, after
having tied 89-89 at the end of regulation time.
Olympic champion
Before going to the NBA, Volkov and his teammates
would reach the peak of their careers at the 1988 Olympics
in Seoul. After losing the first game of the group
stage to Yugoslavia, the USSR team won all its remaining
games. In the semifinals, they defeated the United
States 82-76, and in the gold-medal game, the victim
was Yugoslavia by the score of 76-63. In 26 minutes,
Volkov scored 7 points and pulled down 3 boards.
From 1981 to 1986, Volkov played with Budivelnyk
Kiev and from 1986 to 1988 he was part of the CSKA
Moscow team. For the 1988-89 season, he was back
to Budivelnyk. Right before his trip to America, Volkov
played the 1989 EuroBasket in Zagreb and completed
his medal collection. In addition to the previous gold
and silver medals, he took a bronze after the USSR’s
surprising loss to Greece in the semis, 81-80. Volkov’s
scoring average was 17.2 points in the tournament.
It was also the last tournament for the USSR with the
Lithuanian players like Sabonis, Marciulionis and Valdemaras
Chomicius.
Volkov’s NBA debut for Atlanta took place on November
3, 1989, in a game won by Indiana, 126-103. It
was just a symbolic debut because Volkov played only
1 minute and couldn’t contribute anything. Officially,
however, his NBA adventure started that day. It was
a game full of stars. On Indiana’s side, we could find
Reggie Miller (36 points), Schrempf and Vern Fleming,
while Atlanta had Dominique Wilkins, Moses Malone
and Doc Rivers. In three years in the NBA, Volkov played
149 games with an average of 14.1 minutes, 6.8 points
and 2.6 rebounds. I think that, by today’s standards, he
would probably double those figures.
Already as an NBA player, Volkov attended the 1990
World Cup in Buenos Aires and he won his second silver
medal as the USSR was defeated by Yugoslavia in the
final 92-75. With 15 points, Volkov was his team’s best
scorer, along with Gundars Vetra. On the other side,
there was the Yugoslav “Dream Team” with Drazen
Petrovic, Vlade Divac, Toni Kukoc, Zarko Paspalj, Zoran
Savic, Velimir Perasovic, Jure Zdovc, Zeljko Obradovic
and Arijan Komazec.
Volkov’s last great international competition was
the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona. He played for the
CIS, a team formed by players from the former Soviet
republics except for the Baltic countries. One of those
Baltic countries, Lithuania, won the bronze medal. The
CIS lost out on a medal by losing to Croatia in the semifinals
75-74 in a game that Volkov is probably not fond
of since he missed two free throws down the stretch.
Back to Europe
After three years in the NBA, but with several serious
injuries along the way, Volkov returned to Europe in
1992. His first stop was Italy with Reggio Calabria. In 27
Italian League games, he averaged 19.3 points. He then
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had offers from FC Barcelona and Panathinaikos and he
chose the Greek team, with whom he reached the 1994
EuroLeague Final Four in Tel Aviv. He played a great season,
with 18.2 points and 8.1 rebounds in Europe, as
well as 14.6 points per game in the Greek League.
Despite his two great performances at the Final Four
– 32 points against Olympiacos in the semifinals and 29
against Barcelona in the game for third place – Panathinaikos
could only finish third. I think that was the best
Volkov performance I ever saw live. The following year
he went to archrival Olympiacos, with EuroLeague averages
of 12.3 points, 6.5 rebounds and 2.0 assists, while
he put up 15.8 points per game in the Greek League.
Back problems forced him to retire at age 31, even
though he would be back for a brief period of time a little
later. In the preliminary round for the 1999 EuroBasket
in France, he decided to help Ukraine. He was back
on the court at age 35, and he did pretty well. Against
Spain, he had 14 points and 8 boards, against Israel 8
plus 8, and against England 13 plus 7. But Ukraine didn’t
manage to qualify.
In the year 2000, Volkov founded a new club, BC
Kyiv, where he played until 2002, when he retired for
good. Since then he has become a politician. He was
the minister of sports in his country, was elected several
times to the Ukrainian parliament, and served as
president of the national basketball federation. For the
2011 EuroBasket in Lithuania, Volkov signed his former
coach in Atlanta, Mike Fratello, as the national team
coach for Ukraine. With Fratello still on the bench at the
2013 EuroBasket in Slovenia, Ukraine finished sixth,
ahead of teams like Serbia, Italy and Greece, and was
able to qualify to the World Cup of 2014 in Spain – a first
for the country.
Sasha Volkov, the symbol of Ukraine. He was a great
player who continued to do great things for his country
in basketball.
Oleksandr Volkov
101 greats of european basketball
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