After the World Cup draw in Barcelona, Spain I traveled to Kiev for the 2014 Ukraine Cup. Prior to the championship game on Sunday I ran a coaching clinic with four of my assistants, and we had about 160 attendees. Then we watched Budivelnik beat Donetsk for the Ukraine Cup title!
Photo courtesy of Oleksiy Naumov.
Anti-government protests in Ukraine intensified over the weekend. Thousands of people who oppose the protests converged on their tent camp in Kiev’s Independence Square. And hundreds of security forces gathered in the area. Though the demonstrations have been confined to a relatively small location downtown, the congestion has altered traffic patterns so it takes much longer to get around central Kiev. And the protests forced us to use a different hotel as our headquarters.
Flew into San Antonio for Tuesday’s Nets-Spurs matchup on YES and got a chance to spend some time with the architect of the most envied program in the NBA, San Antonio Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich.
After Falling to Croatia in the quarterfinals 84-72 on Thursday, Ukraine bounced back to beat Italy 66-58 on Friday and earn an automatic bid to the FIBA World Championship for the first time ever! Today we played a competitive game against Slovenia for fifth place in front of their spirited home crowd, but unfortunately we came up short 69-63. I couldn’t be prouder of our team’s effort in this tournament and our historic run to the Elite 8. Now our players will return to their respective teams to get ready for the start of the regular season. Look forward to regrouping in Spain next summer to compete in the 2014 FIBA World Cup!
Photos courtesy of FIBA Europe’s official EuroBasket 2013 website.
For the first time in the national basketball team’s history, Ukraine is among the eight teams that advanced to the EuroBasket 2013 Quarterfinals. We’ll play Croatia, the top seed in our group of four, for a shot at the semis. Rooted in a rich basketball tradition, Croatia is tall, long, athletic and very skilled, so we’ll have our hands full. CRO vs. UKR tips off Thursday, Sept. 19 at 11:45AM ET at Stozice Arena in Ljubljana, Slovenia.
Photos courtesy of FIBA Europe’s official EuroBasket 2013 website.
