By Johnny Askounis/ info@eurohoops.net
Checking the latest moves for 7DAYS EuroCup teams, Cedevita Olimpija, Lietkabelis, and Turk Telekom added to their rosters.
Croatian international big man Karlo Matkovic will play for the team located in Ljubljana in 2022-23.
Per the press release: “The talented center Karlo Matković will join the team of Cedevita Olimpija in the coming season. The latter signed a professional contract with the then Zagreb Cedevita in April 2019, and then wore the jersey of the Serbian OKK Belgrade and Mega MIS as a player on loan.
In the Cedevita Olimpija jersey, we will be able to follow another talented player from the area of the former common country in the 2022/23 competition season. Karlo Matković, 208 centimeters tall center, who has already worn the jersey of Zagreb’s Cedevita in his career, will move to the Dragon’s Nest for the first time, as from 2019 onwards he was on loan to OKK Beograd and Mega MIS. Now, for the first time since the merger of Cedevita and Olimpija in 2019, Matković will defend the colors of Cedevita Olimpija.
“We are happy that Karlo Matković will join us in Ljubljana after three seasons, which he was able to use as a loan player to gain much-needed experience. Karlo is a part of Cedevita Olimpija, and in the last two seasons in Mega he proved what a talented basketball player he is, and we all expect him to improve even more under the watchful eye of our expert staff in Ljubljana, and at the same time help our team achieve all our competitive goals,” said the sports director of Cedevita Olimpija, Sani Bečirović. The head coach of the Ljubljana team, Jurica Golemac, said: “Finally, Karlo landed among us in Cedevita Olimpija. We are very happy that he will be joining us. He is a player who has a lot of potential, but at the same time he is also a grateful and young player with a lot of youthful energy, which he will transfer to the whole team. He will surely progress with us and help us achieve our goals. I’m really happy and can’t wait to get down to work and for him to join us because he will definitely fit into our system of fast and energetic play with a lot of rebounding and contact.”
“I am very happy to be a part of Cedevita Olimpija in the coming season. I can’t wait to get to Ljubljana, to meet my new teammates, to start preparations and for the new season to begin. Even now, I invite the fans to join us at our home games and to support us,” said Karlo Matković upon announcing that he will be part of Cedevita Olimpija in the new season.
Karlo Matković made his first professional basketball steps in the 2018/19 season in the jersey of the then Zagreb Cedevita, and in April 2019 he also signed his first professional contract. In September 2019, after the creation of Cedevita Olimpija, he was loaned to Belgrade’s OKK Beograd, where he spent one season and competed in the Serbian national championship. Before the start of the 2020/21 season, he was then loaned to Mega MIS, where he developed and played the last two seasons.
In the 2021/22 season, Matković played for Mega MIS in 25 regular season matches of the regional league. On average, he spent 21.4 minutes per game on the floor, scoring 11.6 points, 6.1 rebounds and 1.1 assists per game, while also awarding 1.1 blocks per game. His outstanding performances were also the reason he was selected by the New Orleans Pelicans as the 52nd in a row in the NBA Draft in June, and he also played for the Pelicans in the summer league of the strongest basketball competition in the world this summer.
In 2017, Matković participated in the elite Jordan Brand Classic camp, and a year later he also participated in the European Basketball without Borders camp in Belgrade.
After defending the colors of Bosnia and Herzegovina at the European Championships for boys under 18 in 2018, in November 2021 Matković expressed his desire to represent Croatia at the international level in the member category. He made his debut in the jersey of the Croatian men’s national team in the qualifications for the 2023 World Cup, and so far he has played for Croatia in two games, averaging 8.0 points and 7.0 rebounds per game.”
Elsewhere in the EuroCup field, Lietkabelis added Croatian forward Zeljko Sakic and Turk Telekom picked up Xavier product Tyrique Jones.
Photo Credit: FIBA.BASKETBALL