101 Greats of European Basketball

Vladimir Stankovic
impossible for him to get out of Yugoslavia and even
more difficult to sign for a team from Spain, a country
with whom Yugoslavia didn’t have diplomatic relations.
In the 1963 eighthfinals against Alsace Bagnolet of
France, Daneu was the unwilling protagonist of a scandal.
Daneu was in the military service in Belgrade, and
without him, Olimpija lost 80-61. For the second game,
the club moved heaven and earth to try to get Daneu to
play. Permission arrived at the last minute and he left
in his car at about noon. It was a 635-kilometer drive
to Ljubljana and at that time it took about eight hours
due to bad roads and, especially, the snow. Olimpija
waited for Daneu and delayed the start of the game for
almost two hours. The French protested, but the game
didn’t start until news reached the arena that Daneu
was stranded in the middle of the snow. Without him,
Olimpija won 128-94. The French team signed an official
protest to FIBA, who didn’t even want to hear about it.
What is for sure and from what I saw, on television
or in person – taking into account that I started working
in the spring of 1967 – is that Daneu was Olimpija’s best
player by far: a creator, a game director, the soul of his
team. Unlike the lack of data on his league appearances,
there is a lot of information from his national team
years. At the 1959 EuroBasket in Sofia, with Korac by
his side, Daneu averaged 8.1 points. In the Rome Olympics
he was up to 9.9 and at the Belgrade EuroBasket,
where Yugoslavia got its first medal, he reached 12.2.
At the 1963 World Cup in Rio, he averaged 11.9 points
with a decisive basket for a win over the United States.
He averaged 13.6 at the Poland EuroBasket after that.
At the Tokyo Olympics he scored 12.1 points and in
1965 EuroBasket in Moscow he had 12.4. He reached
15.0 points at the 1967 World Cup in Montevideo. At
that championship – where his team won a silver medal
– Daneu was chosen MVP of the event. When we talk
about his scoring numbers, we must remember that
he was not a natural scorer. He was all about smarts,
game vision, assists and a secure hand for the last
shot. His specialty, like Clifford Luyk, was the hook shot.
He always dribbled to the right corner and, after leaving
his rivals behind, he shot his sky hook from the corner,
parallel to the backboard.
For the 1967 EuroBasket in Helsinki, Yugoslav coach
Ranko Zeravica wanted to inject young blood into the
team and left out some veterans like Daneu and Korac.
But after the failure of that team (ninth place), both were
called again for the 1968 Olympics in Mexico. Daneu
responded with brilliant play. His scoring average was
13.9 points, but all the plays started in his hands, all
the possessions were his first. In a dramatic semifinal
against the USSR, with Yugoslavia trailing 58-57, a great
assist from Daneu led to a foul on a young Kresimir
Cosic, who scored both free throws. Petar Skansi, after
a failed attack by the Soviets, increased the lead to 61-
58. Anatoli Povidola scored for the rivals, but then, the
most famous three seconds in Yugoslavian basketball
took place: another pass from Daneu to Vladimir Cvetkovic,
who was fouled. All of Yugoslavia stopped in front
of the TV screen. Daneu walked up to Cvetkovic and told
him: “Take it easy, you will score both.”
And Cvetkovic did. The final basket, by Sergey Belov
to make it 63-62, was not very useful. In the final, Yugoslavia
lost to the United States, led by Spencer Haywood
(21 points) and Jo Jo White (14), by the final score
65-50. Only Daneu, who scored 16, stood out against
the Americans.
World champion
After winning another silver medal at the 1969 Euro-
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