Mirza Delibašić
Mirza Delibašić (Serbo-Croatian Cyrillic: Мирза Делибашић; 9 January 1954 – 8 December 2001) was a Bosnian professional basketball player and coach.
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Delibašić was named one of FIBA's 50 Greatest Players in 1991. He was enshrined into the FIBA Hall of Fame in 2007. In 2008, he was named one of the 50 Greatest EuroLeague Contributors. He is widely considered as one of the best shooters in the history of European basketball.
Early life
Born in Tuzla, PR Bosnia and Herzegovina, to Izet Delibašić and Zajkana (née Mehičević),[1] young Mirza took up tennis and excelled at it. By the age of fourteen, he switched to basketball.
Club career
Mirza Delibašić, nicknamed Kinđe, led his club Bosna to the EuroLeague Championship in 1979. He played his first games at age of 15 for KK Sloboda Dita, Tuzla's basketball club. Three years later, in 1971, he signed a contract with KK Bosna. After leaving Bosna, Delibašić went to the Spanish Primera División, where he ended up being considered one of the best players ever to play for Real Madrid, along with the likes of Juan Corbalán, Wayne Brabender, Fernando Martín Espina, Fernando Romay, Dražen Petrović, and Arvydas Sabonis.
In his club career, he won numerous titles in European club competitions. In addition to having played together for their Yugoslav national team, Mirza Delibašić and Dražen Dalipagić, also played together with Real Madrid. Their performance in a 1983 EuroLeague game versus Cibona, in Zagreb, is only one of the many highlights of their careers. In that game, Delibašić scored 26 points and Dalipagić 33. The game appropriately finished with a two-on-one fast-break, with Delibašić making a behind-the-back fake pass to Dalipagić, and passing by a defender for a two-handed dunk at the buzzer. Cibona's fans put aside their team's loss in the game, and showed their appreciation for the Bosnian stars performances, with a standing ovation at the end of the game.
Career ending
In early summer 1983, the then twenty-nine-year-old Delibašić left Real Madrid and signed with the Italian League club JuveCaserta, which was at the time coached by his former Bosna mentor Bogdan Tanjević.
In August 1983, the team went to preseason training and conditioning, to the town of Bormio, in the Italian Alps. After coming back south to Caserta, following the grueling altitude training, Delibašić suffered a near-fatal brain hemorrhage that would turn out to be career-ending. Being in a critical condition, a private plane was immediately organized for him to be airlifted to the Military Medical Academy (VMA) in Belgrade, where he was hospitalized for months. He survived and recovered, but not enough to return to playing basketball, thus forcing him to permanently retire from playing, effective immediately.
National team career
En route to a place among the greatest European players, Mirza Delibašić won every major FIBA tournament with the senior Yugoslavian national basketball team, including: the Summer Olympic Games gold medal, at the 1980 Summer Olympics, EuroBasket gold two times (1975 EuroBasket and 1977 EuroBasket), and the FIBA World Cup gold at the 1978 FIBA World Championship.
Awards and accomplishments
Professional career
- 2× Yugoslav League Champion: (1978, 1980)
- Yugoslav Cup Winner: (1978)
- EuroLeague Champion: (1979)
- FIBA Club World Cup Champion: (1981)
- Spanish League Champion: (1982)
- FIBA's 50 Greatest Players: (1991)
- Bosnia and Herzegovina Sportsman of the 20th century: (2000)
- FIBA Hall of Fame: (2007)
- 50 Greatest EuroLeague Contributors: (2008)
Coaching career
Delibašić lived in Sarajevo throughout the 1992-1996 siege of the city. Simultaneously, Delibašić coached the newly-established Bosnian national basketball team at EuroBasket 1993 in Germany, where they finished in 8th place.[2]
Personal life and death
In the late 1970s, Delibašić married his girlfriend Branka. Their son Dario was born in December 1979. The couple divorced in 1980, after Delibašić moved abroad to play with Real Madrid.
In 1986, Delibašić, then retired from playing basketball and performing an administrative role at KK Bosna, married Slavica Šuka,[3] an active basketball player with ŽKK Bosna. The same year in October, the couple had a son named Danko.
Delibašić's final years were marked by persistent health problems, due to his heavy drinking, which led to his death in 2001, at the age of 47, in Sarajevo. He is interred next to singer Davorin Popović (who died earlier that year), in the Alley of Greats at Bare Cemetery. His funeral was attended by thousands. After his death, KK Bosna renamed its arena in his honor.
References
- "Bogdan Tanjević: Kako je Mirza postao Sarajlija". Ljubusaci.com. 8 December 2018. Retrieved 31 December 2019.
- http://www.klix.ba/sport/kosarka/kosarkaska-reprezentacija-bih-je-1993-ostvarila-najveci-uspjeh-osmo-mjesto/130803084
- Glušac, Borislav (1987). "Ljubav između koševa". Ven. Retrieved 15 December 2019.
External links
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