101 Greats of European Basketball

The Golden
Slovenian
Slovenian basketball reserves its “greatest
of all time” title for the legendary Ivo
Daneu, but Jurij “Jure” Zdovc was not
far behind him. Those two, along with
Peter Vilfan and Borut Basin, are the best
Slovenian players of the last century, in
my opinion, while crossing into this one, we have had
the likes of Matjaz Smodis, Erazem Lorbek and Rasho
Nesterovic, without taking into account others who
are still active, such as Goran Dragic and, just getting
started, Luka Doncic.
The talent of Zdovc, a new gem from Slovenia,
caught the attention of the Yugoslav Federation’s
coaches early. By 1983, at age 16, Zdovc was playing
in the European Championship for Cadets in Tubingen,
Germany, where he won his first gold medal. Among his
teammates were future stars Zarko Paspalj, Ivo Nakic,
Branislav Prelevic, Luka Pavicevic and Ivica Mavrenski.
That very same year, Zdovc played at the junior World
Cup in Palma de Mallorca, Spain, as the youngest player
on the Yugoslav team. A year later, Zdovc played the European
Championship for Junior Men with almost the
same team, plus Velimir Perasovic, Miroslav Pecarski,
Franjo Arapovic and Ivica Zuric. They won the bronze
medal.
Champion without a medal
By the 1985-86 season, Zdovc was already an important
player for Olimpija Ljubljana. Two years later,
Coach Dusan Ivkovic took him to his first big competition
– the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul, South Korea.
He came back with a silver medal. He shined at Euro-
Basket 1989 along with all the members of the “Yugoslav
Dream Team” – Drazen Petrovic, Vlade Divac, Toni
Kukoc, Dino Radja, Predrag Danilovic, Zarko Paspalj,
Zoran Cutura... In 1990 and with the same team, Yugoslavia
won the World Cup in Argentina and subsequently
got the gold medal at EuroBasket 1991 in Rome, Italy.
Zdovc, however, only played early in that tournament
and didn’t finish it with the team.
Politics caused one of the most curious scenarios in
basketball history. Yugoslavia arrived in Rome as the
favorite. Drazen Petrovic was missing, but Sasha Djordjevic
had joined the team. In three group stage games,
Yugoslavia recorded as many easy wins. Zdovc had 7
points against Bulgaria, 3 against Poland and 4 against
Spain. On July 26, 1991, the day before the semifinals,
Zdovc knocked on Dusan Ivkovic’s door. With tears in
his eyes, Zdovc told Ivkovic that the Slovenian government,
which declared independence from Yugoslavia
on July 25, had ordered him to leave the team. Yugoslavia
beat France in the semifinals and Italy in the title
game without much trouble, but without Zdovc. When
the medals were awarded on the podium, there was
one extra. Eleven players – all Serbian and Croatian,
but still all Yugoslavian – celebrated, but one medal
remained without its owner.
The story has a second chapter, some 14 years later.
On June 30, 2005, in the Slovenian capital, Zdovc, who
was already working as a head coach, was honored
for his playing career. On one side there was a “green”
team with Zmago Sagadin and Bozidar Maljkovic as
head coaches and Dusan Hauptman, Primoz Brezec,
Beno Udrih, Rasho Nesterovic, Sarunas Jasikevicius,
101 greats of european basketball
Jure Zdovc
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