By Joan Danés

 

Was in Turkey (Konya), his home. Omer Ugurata and the rest of Turkish NT won the Gold Medal at the U18 European Championship, a big performance for the basketball in that country. We talked with the Head Coach. 

 

-What were your feelings after winning the final?
It’s a great feeling to get the gold medal in our home court. I am really proud of my players. They really deserved this title with working hard. But the most important thing for our success is, all the time they kept it together. They just did not play selfish, they played for the team.

-Which were the characteristics of your team?
I believe that our open court tempo, scoring easy lay ups and team defense were our best characteristics for the game. When you play in high tempo basketball, you share the ball better and in most of the games all of the team got a chance to score in the game.

-What can you say about Egemen Güven, MVP championship?
Egemen is an excellent player but more important is he is a good guy. He always smiles off the court, very good friend with all other players and a good team captain. Last year after practicing with senior team of Karsiyaka, he improved a lot. Especially mentally he grew a lot. He has to improve physically but this year he will get more playing time in TBL and next year he will come to NT in better shape I hope.

-1997 born player Furkan Korkmaz was important. What you can tell us about him?
Furkan is also very hard working player. Last summer he was the top scorer in U16 EC. When we started to work together we explain him the difference of his role in this team. He adapted and played better each day. He is an excellent shooter with very good athletic skills. He also showed in Konya that he can defense anybody and help team in rebounds a lot.

-What has been the key to winning two consecutive European U18 ECs?
We are working together with Coach Taner Günay since 2009. We started the selection of 95-96 generation together. I was his assistant that time but he was always like a big brother to me. We run the same system. Main ideas were always the same. Maybe that was one of the reasons why we got the title two times in a row. Actually our behavior during the game and communication with the players are very different but we both won the gold. I am really happy and proud for both of us.

-What is the working method of the Turkish Federation with youth teams?
TBF invest a lot in youth programs. We have a difficult and wide selection progress which starts two years before the players can actually join the U16 NT. We have 7 different cities to call all players for our tests. Then another time we move to these cities for a weekend and have a camp with 40 -50 players. Then in summer we combine all cities in a center and we work with 100+ players. Then we got the final 20-player roster. But also we watch all the club competitions, high school games and Turkish Championships to invite better players for NT.

 

Photo: FIBA Europe / Castoria - De Massis

 

Twitter of the author: @joandanes