NIKOLA PLECAS - 101 Greats of European Basketball

Nikola
Plecas
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Saint Nikola
If someone were to ask me who were the best
players ever from Zagreb, my answer would be Nikola
Plecas (PLEH-chash), Mihovil Nakic and Zoran
Cutura – in that order. Surprised? Where is Drazen
Petrovic? And I would agree with you, but the catch
is I am talking about players who left a big mark
and were born or raised in Zagreb. Plecas was born
on January 10, 1948 in Bruvno and arrived in Zagreb
at age 6. He started his brilliant career there and, in
fact, he still lives there, even if he is not very involved
in basketball anymore. He’s from my generation and
I admit a certain subjectivity towards him, but I do
believe that the facts, numbers and witnesses justify
his presence among the great players of the past.
To introduce Plecas to the youngsters who were not
lucky enough to see him in action, let me tell you a story
about the first Korac Cup final in the 1971-72 season. FI-
BA had established this competition to honor the great
Serbian scorer Radivoj Korac, who passed way in a car
crash on June 2, 1969. Only eight teams signed up: two
from Spain (Manresa and Picadero JC), two from France
(Olympique Antibes and Caen), two from Yugoslavia
(Lokomotiva Zagreb and OKK Belgrade, Korac’s club of
origin), and one each from Germany (USC Munich) and
Belgium (Standard Liege). The first final featured the two
Yugoslav teams, and the format was a home-and-away
two-game series. I was at the game played in the old
Sports Palace of New Belgrade on February 29, 1972.
OKK won 83-71 despite 29 points scored by Plecas for
Lokomotiva Zagreb, the guests. On March 7, the second
game was played in Zagreb. At the break, OKK was
ahead, 48-40, which added up to a 20-point aggregate
advantage with the 12 from the first game. Basketball is a
collective sport, but that game turned into evidence that
a single player can win a game by himself. Lokomotiva
ended up winning the game, 94-73 (54-25 in the second
half) and took the trophy! Plecas finished the game with
40 points, most of them in the second half.
Pero Zlatar, a prestigious Croatian journalist and
president of Lokomotiva in the 1970s – before the
club changed its name to Cibona, by the way – was the
man who set the foundations of what would be one of
the great clubs in Europe in the following years. Zlatar
wrote an article about Plecas in which he said:
“At the break in the final against OKK Belgrade,
aside from trailing by 8 points, Lokomotiva was about
to fall into the abyss because Plecas already had four
fouls. Despite all that, he stepped on the court like a lion
and in just a few minutes, Lokomotiva scored 21 points,
most of them by Plecas, and allowed only 1. Plecas
made each and every shot, from every position. It was
unforgettable.”
Zlatar also assures us that during the 1970s, Nikola
Plecas was the most popular sportsman in Zagreb, ahead
of the aces from other sports – football included. He was
an idol for the fans, who dubbed him “Saint Nikola”.
Duo with Solman
There may have been no humbler club in the world
than Mladost of Zagreb, which produced two world
champions and an Olympic champion, who also won
several European titles at the club and national team
levels. I am referring to Mihovil Nakic, Damir Solman
and Nikola Plecas. The latter two played together there,
as they were the same age, and together they caught
the attention of the big clubs.
101 greats of european basketball
Nikola Plecas
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Vladimir Stankovic
Lokomotiva wanted to sign both, but Jugoplastika offered
Solman terms that the Zagreb club could not match,
and therefore he went to Split. (That’s why he’s not on my
Zagreb list, because he played most of his career in Split).
Plecas decided to accept Lokomotiva’s offer, but Mladost
wouldn’t release his papers. He had to spend 10 months
without playing, but in the end the federation gave the
green light, and Plecas was registered by Lokomotiva at
noon on July 12, 1967. That same night he made his debut
against Crvena Zvezda. He starred with 26 points. The Yugoslav
League was still played during the summer, then,
but would start to be played in arenas the following year.
Lokomotiva won 106-96 against a strong Crvena Zvezda
team with veterans Vladimir Cvetkovic and Sreten Dragojlovic,
plus youngsters like Ljubodrag Simonovic, Dragan
Kapicic and Dragisa Vucinic. Soon, in the Yugoslav Cup
final, Lokomotiva defeated Olimpija 78-77 for what would
become Plecas’s first big trophy.
Although it was his debut in the league that year,
Plecas was already an established talent. The flawless
scouting service of the Yugoslav federation had all the top
talents on file. Solman had made his debut in the national
team in 1964 and Plecas did the same one year later, in
the Balkans championship in Kraljevo, Serbia. Yugoslavia
ended up second despite playing at home because it lost
to Bulgaria. However, Coach Ranko Zeravica had four players
on the team who, only five years later, would be world
champions with him still on the bench. They were Plecas,
Simonovic, Kapicic and Aljosa Zorga. Bogdan Tanjevic, a
future great coach, was also there. Talk about vision.
Zeravica took some youngsters to the 1967 EuroBasket
in Helsinki, but not Plecas, whose debut on the great
international stage was postponed until the 1968 Olympics
in Mexico. He returned from Mexico with a silver
medal around his neck, contributing 9 points per game.
Triumph in Ljubljana
Plecas’s career lasted until the late 1970s, but his
peak came at the 1970 World Cup in Ljubljana. At only
22 years of age, he became a world champion with
players like Kreso Cosic, Kapicic, Solman, Zorga and
Simonovic, who was one year younger. In the decisive
game against the United States, a 70-63 victory, Cosic
netted 15 points, Petar Skansi scored 14 and Plecas
had 12 points on 8-of-10 free throw shooting. He could
always be identified by his moustache, but the following
day, he honored a bet and shaved it off completely.
The following year, Plecas got a call from Aleksandar
Nikolic, the coach at Ignis Varese, the European champ
at the time. The offer was for $60,000 per season to
play at the Italian club, a lot of money back then, not at
all comparable to what he was getting at Cibona. But
he could not leave. The regulations of the federation
said that players had to be at least 28 years old to play
outside the country.
Plecas played with the national team until 1975. He
won gold medals at the 1973 EuroBasket in Barcelona
(the first for Yugoslavia) and the 1975 EuroBasket in
Belgrade. He had previously one two EuroBasket silver
medals, in Naples in 1969 and in Essen in 1971, then
added a silver at the 1974 World Cup in San Juan.
Plecas also took part in the 1972 Olympics in Munich,
where the team finished fifth. In the meantime, he was
also a starter for his team every year. He broke countless
records – in one game against Partizan, he scored
67 points – and he was the league’s top scorer twice, in
1969-70 (30.9 points per game) and 1974-75 (33.1). In
between, the top scorer for the 1972-73 season was his
friend Damir Solman for Jugoplastika (31.0).
In researching data on Plecas, I found an interesting
figure: between 1957 and 1982 – that’s 25 years – the
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top scorers of the Yugoslav League averaged below 30
points, and then by a small margin, just three times!
Those three times were all by Radmilo Misovic of Borac
Cacak, with 29.5 points in 1967-68, 28.2 points in 1968-
69 and 29.4 points in 1970-71. That league featured
some true scoring aces, ranging from Korac (38.0 ppg.
in 1958) to Misovic, Solman and Plecas and finally to
Dragan Kicanovic and Drazen Dalipagic.
On the eve of the 1976 Olympics in Montreal, Plecas
was pulled from the national team for a reason that
would seem incomprehensible today. He was kicked out
for “violating the principles of amateurism” because he
had featured in a commercial for tea! In the federation,
they were worried about the possible reaction by the
International Olympic Committee with American Avery
Brundage, who was very conservative, at the helm. Plecas
was convinced that it was some sort of scheme to
free one place for another player.
Over seven years, Plecas had been a fixture on the
national team, playing 215 games and scoring 1,315
points. After that, his relationship with Mirko Novosel, the
coach of the national team and, starting in the fall of 1976,
Cibona, got worse. After 10 years, 204 games and 5,404
points (26.5 per game!) in the Yugoslav League, Plecas
decided to leave Cibona. He signed for modest Kvarner Rijeka
and played at his usual level the first season, averaging
28.9 points. But in his second season there, he played
just nine games, and at 30 years old practically vanished
into thin air. With 6,192 points scored, he ranks seventh all
time and his scoring average is sixth all time.
Plecas was a scoring machine. Standing at 1.87 meters,
he was a shooting guard who could also play the
point because of his technique. He was a natural scorer
with a privileged touch. His shooting percentages were
always high and his numbers, impressive ... and without
three-pointers! With those, Plecas would have scored
even more. He was also a good rebounder, but his main
weapons were his shot and his penetration. He was able
to drive through the forests of arms and legs to find the
spot to score. Also, he was a fighter with strong character.
His special play was what they would call today the
Euro-step. Plecas patented that shot on the third step,
using the backboard a lot. He says that many coaches
tried to correct his “irregular shot” but Marijan Katineli,
his coach at Mladost and later at Lokomotiva, saw it as
an advantage and encouraged him to perfect it.
Ivica Dukan, who was a forward at Jugoplastika
Split for 11 years and has been with the Chicago Bulls
as assistant general manager for the last 20 years, told
me: “I agree with your list of best players from Zagreb.
Plecas was number one, a great player. I played against
him and I remember that it was very hard to stop him
because of his atypical shot, on the third step, without
any balance and from impossible angles.”
Plecas explained that he never lifted weights and
that his practices were always with the ball. He says
that in his era, offensive plays lasted from 7 to 11
seconds and now they take about 20 seconds. When
teams score 55 points, he says, everybody talks about
“good defense” and not about bad offense. His idols
were Ivo Daneu of Olimpija (because of his perfection
and vision), Miodrag Nikolic of OKK Belgrade (because
of his technique) and Pino Djerdja of Zadar (because of
his will, desire, hustle and leadership). Daneu was the
captain of the great Yugoslav team with whom Plecas
won the 1970 World Cup. But through his game, his
points and his artful baskets, Nikola Plecas earned a
place forever in the memories of those who were fortunate
enough to see him play.
It was a true privilege.
101 greats of european basketball
Nikola Plecas
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