By Antigoni Zachari / info@eurohoops.net
2021 Basketball Champions League coach of the Year Zoran Lukic officially takes over the Russian national team bench, the Russian Basketball Federation announced Friday.
Lukic will continue working with Nizhny Novgorod in the BCL as normal and in the second half of November, the NT will hold its first training camp.
Russia faces Italy and Iceland on November 26 and 29 respectively for the 2023 World Cup Qualifiers in St. Petersburg.
“A new page begins in the history of the Russian national team with a new head coach. Having collected a huge number of opinions of basketball experts, the RBF came to the conclusion that the team simply needs a new impulse. In fact, Zoran will have to start from scratch – and immediately into battle, and postpone the main part of the preparation of the national team until the summer training camp”, said Russian Federation President Andrei Kirilenko.
Lukic commented the following upon the announcement of the Federation:
“At the end of September, we had our first meeting with Andrei Kirilenko and the leadership of the federation. We had a productive conversation, and I immediately felt great interest. And this Wednesday I presented to the RBF Coaching Council my philosophy, my views on the direction in which the Russian team should develop further. Also a good constructive conversation, everything went positively, without difficult moments. In Nizhny Novgorod, we traditionally try to maintain the maximum balance between achieving sports results and providing practice to young players. It is often difficult for coaches to find this middle ground, but there is nothing new for me here. It is a great honor to lead the national team, but I would accept such an offer only from two national teams – Russia and Serbia”
Photo: BCL