101 Greats of European Basketball

The brains of
FC Barcelona
From today’s perspective, it seems impossible
that a great player can spend all his
career at the same club. It was not so usual
many years ago, either, but there were cases
of eternal loyalty. One that stands out was
Ignacio “Nacho” Solozabal, who was born
in Barcelona on August 1, 1958, and would spend his
entire career, from 1975 to 1992, with FC Barcelona.
He was a natural playmaker, a left-hander and a great
organizer, but he was also a great shooter who came
to the rescue when his team needed his points more
than his assists.
Solazabal was part of a gifted generation of players
on a Barça team with Juan Antonio “Epi” San Epifanio,
Audie Norris, Andres Jimenez, Chicho Sibilio and Juan
De la Cruz. In the 1980s, they formed a great core that
only fell short of one thing: a crown in Europe’s top
competition. They played three EuroLeague finals and
lost them all. There was some consolation in winning
two Saporta Cup titles, one Korac Cup title and one
Intercontinental Cup title, but Solozabal’s biggest satisfaction
came with the Spanish national team, with
whom he won two silver medals: the first at the 1983
EuroBasket in Nantes and one year later at the 1984
Olympics in Los Angeles.
A great reserve
At 17 years old, Nacho Solozabal was already
a player who stood out in the junior categories of
Barcelona. Antoni Serra, the Spanish head coach for
cadets, called him to play in the third FIBA European
Championship for Cadets. It was held in 1975 in Thessaloniki
and Athens. Together with him were Epi, Juan
Manuel Lopez Iturriaga and Jordi Ribas, the father of
Pau Ribas, a future Barcelona player. On other teams
of that tournament, there were future superstars like
Panagiotis Giannakis of Greece, Aleksandar Belostenny
of the Soviet Union or Peter Vilfan and Aleksandar
Petrovic of Yugoslavia. Spain finished fifth, but Solozabal,
with an average of 11.3 points, was among the
best players.
One year later, at the 1976 FIBA European Championship
for Junior Men, played in Santiago de Compostela,
Spain, coach Ignacio Pinedo added some new players
to his team, like Fernando Romay and Jose Antonio
Querejeta. Spain took the bronze medal, its second
straight prize after the silver medal the previous year
in Orleans, France in the same competition. Epi and
Solozabal, teammates at Barcelona, were promoted
together to the club’s first team and would become
synonymous with the Catalan club for the following 15
years.
They formed a perfect duo: a thinking playmaker
with great game vision and a forward who could score
from any situation. They were a lethal combination.
Solozabal, one year older, retired first in 1992. His
Spanish League numbers say that he played 349 games
totaling 10,503 minutes on the floor. He scored 3,608
points (averaging 10.3, with a personal high of 29) on
59% two-point, 39% three-point and 80% free throw
shooting, plus 2 rebounds and 2.2 assists per game.
In his brilliant career, Solozabal also won six Spanish
League titles (the first in 1981, the last in 1990), nine
Spanish King’s Cups (the first in 1978, the last in 1991),
101 greats of european basketball
Nacho Solozabal
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