101 Greats of European Basketball

The legend
that lives on
The basketball world, especially the older
generations, knows the sporting history
of the great player Radivoj Korac, whose
humble character was the opposite of
his on-court greatness. He was the best,
but for Korac, there was no such thing
as “me”. All the praise he received – from the press,
the crowds, his teammates – he always handled with
incredible modesty and almost as if it didn’t have anything
to do with him. He was very kind, generous and
always surrounded by friends.
Korac was a well-mannered man with many interests.
There was no theater premiere in Belgrade at
which he was not present. His circle of friends included
actors, singers and artists of all kinds. His record
collection was the biggest and best in Belgrade as he
always brought new records with him after every trip
abroad. Thanks to him in fact, a music show at Radio
Belgrade was able to play The Beatles for the first time
ever, and his comment was: “This band will be huge.”
He was a lover of movies and literature, and his favorite
writers were James Joyce, Norman Mailer, George
Bernard Shaw and William Faulkner. His other passion
was ... jerseys. He had hundreds of them, of all colors.
He only wore a suit on very special occasions. He was
a good student of electrical engineering, even though
he never got his degree. He nearly finished it but left
the finishing touches “for later, when I am done with my
career”. Unfortunately, his life ended sooner.
Some records are simply not meant to be broken,
and in European basketball, the most prestigious one
– single-game scoring – belongs to Korac. Playing for
the club he grew up with, OKK Belgrade, Korac set an
incredible scoring mark that still stands as the most
points scored in the history of the EuroLeague. In an
eighth-finals game against Alvik BK Stockholm of Sweden,
played in Belgrade on January 14, 1965, he scored
an incredible 99 points – in 40 minutes, with no threepoint
shot or shot clock, and without knowing his point
total as the game progressed. OKK won by 155-57
(after having led by 60-17 at the break). The game was
the stage for several other records apart from Korac’s
99 points: in the second half OKK scored 95 points;
the team’s total of 155 points was also a new record,
as was the final victory margin of 98 points. Amazingly
enough, in the first game between the teams, played
exactly one week earlier in Sweden, OKK Belgrade had
won by 90-136 as Korac scores 71 points. Combining
them, the legendary left-hander had an incredible 170
points – an average of 85 – in a single two-game series!
A scoring machine
Korac himself said once that his first meeting with
basketball came in the early 1950s in Karlovac, Croatia,
where his parents – Zagorka and Bogdan – visited
relatives. He started playing in Belgrade at a late age
by today’s standards. He was 16 years old, but he was
the tallest kid in class and played center. Korac played
the same position for the OKK Belgrade juniors in 1954,
despite being only 1.93 meters. From the start of his
career, he wore number 5 on his jersey; he viewed it as
good luck because he was born on November 5, 1938.
Aside from boasting a great sense for scoring from any
spot on the floor – something that he taught himself
101 greats of european basketball
Radivoj Korac
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