- OLYMPICS - Soviets eyeing NBA
About the article
This is a digitised version of an article from The Cayman Compass's print archive. Occasionally, the digitisation process introduces transcription errors, or other problems.
See the article in its original context from September 1988.
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"The boys would like much to play in the NBA. It would be good publicity for Soviet basketball and good practice for the boys," Soviet coach Alexander Gomelski said Monday, the day after his team lost to Yugoslavia 92-79 in its opening game of the tournament. "The NBA is good competition. It is number one in the world. But there are problems."
Gomelski broke the problems down into two categories for the four players who have been drafted or contacted by NBA teams.
"(Sharanus) Marchulionis and (Arvydas) Sabonis play for the two best teams in Lithuania and Sabonis won the national championship, and if they left the club would go down and people would not like that," Gomelski said. "(Valery) Tikhonenko will have the same problem with his team in Moscow because he is leading the team and (Alexander) Volkov is still in the army and couldn't leave until he is done."
The 7-foot-2 (2.15 meters) Sabonis was a first-round draft choice of the Portland Trail Blazers in 1986, the same year the Atlanta Hawks drafted Tikhonenko and Valkov. Marchulionis is considered a free agent but he has said he will play only for the Hawks. Volkov will finish his military committment in December and since he is not playing for one of the Soviet club teams he would face the least resistance in joining an NBA team.
"If not this year, yes next year if it is possible and I am ready," he said. He admitted he wasn't ready in Sunday night's game, one in which he fouled out in the first half, playing 12 minutes and scoring two points. "I didn't want to foul any more in the game but I was very nervous," the 6-9 (2.07 meters) forward said. "It was a black day. I never played before like that."
The practice didn't reflect total dejection on the part of Gomelski or the players. The hourlong session consisted of mostly shooting drills and there was no contact or scrimmaging.
Sabonis, who returned to competition Sunday night after missing 18 months with an Achilles tendon injury, didn't even dress for the practice. He went shirtless and wore blue jeans and shower slippers, doing little more than play horse with another player and the team trainer.
Sabonis, who had 11 points and four rebounds against Yugoslavia, refused to talk with the four U.S. reporters at the practice but Gomelski and Marchulionis seemed pleased with his effort.
"It was the first game for Arvydas and not all the other boys played 100 percent," Gomelski said.
