101 Greats of European Basketball

An octopus
under the rims
When speaking about basketball
in Zagreb, the first associations
are normally Cibona, KK
Zagreb, lately Cedevita and,
of course, some great players
from there. But few people
know that the Croatian capital also has a small club
that produced two world champions and one Olympic
gold medalist, plus several silver and bronze
medalists in great national competitions. And
these three players are the owners of seven continental
titles at the club level, as well. This small club
is Mladost, which translates to “Youth”, and those
three players are Nikola Plecas, Damir Solman and
Mihovil Nakic.
The first two won gold medals with Yugoslavia at the
1970 World Cup in Ljubljana. Two years earlier, they had
won the silver medal at the 1968 Olympics in Mexico
City, too. Nakic was an Olympic champion at Moscow
in 1980 and has an Olympic bronze from Los Angeles
in 1984. All three of the players won several medals
at EuroBaskets: Solman and Plecas gold at Barcelona
in 1973 and Belgrade in 1975, plus silver at Naples in
1969; and Nakic has a bronze from Turin in 1979. At the
club level, Nakic was a EuroLeague champion with Cibona
in 1985 and 1986 and a Saporta Cup title-winner in
1982 and 1987; Solman won two Korac Cup titles, with
Jugoplastika in 1976 and 1977; and Plecas was the first
winner in that competition, in 1972, with Lokomotiva
Zagreb.
From Orleans to Moscow
Mihovil Nakic, who was born on July 13, 1955, in
Drnis, Croatia, was also a gold medalist at the 1974
European Championship for Junior Men in Orleans,
France. Yugoslavia won all of its nine games and in the
final defeated Spain by the score of 80-79. Nakic averaged
5 points, with a high of 14 against Greece. That
was also the first time we saw the gigantic Soviet center
Vladimir Tkachenko (2.20 meters). The best scorer of the
tournament was Polish player Eugeniusz Kijewski (27.2
points). For Italy, there was Renato Villalta, while France
had a good generation with Eric Beugnot (the second
best scorer, with 19.7 points) and Herve Dubuisson.
The Yugoslav team, coached by Bogdan Tanjevic, then
the young coach of Bosna Sarajevo, featured among
others Branko Skroce (best scorer with 17.7 points),
Rajko Zizic, Andro Knego, Ratko Radovanovic and Nakic.
Six years later, the five of them were Olympic champs
in Moscow. Except for Skroce, a left-handed guard and
great shooter, the rest were big men. The shortest one
was Nakic, but despite being only 2.03 meters he had a
great rebounding ability. Many times he ended games
as the best rebounder.
Nakic, known in the world of basketball as “Nik”,
was not a big media star. He was not a player who drew
attention because of his elegance or brilliant technique,
but he was a great player – life insurance, if you will, for
his coaches. Points were not his thing, even though
he would score more than 20. He was the key man on
defense: rebounds, blocks, guarding the best opposing
big man regardless of his height. His big hands, rebounding
ability and great timing for rebounds made
101 greats of european basketball
Mihovil Nakic
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