By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Maccabi Tel Aviv announced that former team coach David Blatt joined the club as chairman of the professional committee and external consultant. Blatt led the Israeli powerhouse to the EuroLeague championship of 2014.
With Maccabi in search of a new coach and in talks with Oded Kattash, a club legend returns to Tel Aviv in order to help restore past glories. The legendary EuroLeague coach was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. He has been battling the disease ever since and talking openly about his experience. And if Maccabi needs something to turn things around, then that’s a real fighter with a championship pedigree.
Per Maccabi: Maccabi Playtika Tel Aviv has signed David Blatt as chairman of the professional committee and external consultant to the club. The legendary coach, who led the Yellows to their sixth European Championship win and was an important factor in the three continental championships that preceded it, will work in collaboration with the professional team and will contribute his rich experience and expertise.
In addition to Blatt, the professional committee will include the following: the head coach, the sports director, and the scouting team. The committee will provide professional support to the Maccabi head coach, who will continue to be the decisive professional authority, and will also report, give its opinion and recommend to the owners on a number of professional issues.
“I am very happy to return to Maccabi Tel Aviv”, David Blatt told the club’s official website. “I am happy to join Nikola Vujcic, Avi Even, and the rest of the professional team and look forward to start working, even though we have already started. We will define and bring in players and people who will help Maccabi return to where it needs to be”.
“I think we took a very big step forward in bringing David Blatt back to the club as chairman of the professional committee”, explained club chairman Shimon Mizrahi. “David knows Maccabi Tel Aviv for long, he won the European championship in Milan in 2014, and he was a coach in the NBA. He won many titles, was the coach of the Russian national team, and had many accomplishments with it. He knows players, he knows the structures of Euroleague teams because he also coached Euroleague teams. I think his contribution will be great. He will work together with the entire professional team and lead us to many successes. He is coming back home”.
David Blatt (63), who also picked up four championships and four trophies as Pini Gershon’s assistant, won with Maccabi as a head coach also five championships, five state cups, and the Adriatic League championship, and was crowned four times as coach of the year in the local league.
Among his many roles and achievements are also winning the European Championship and the Olympic and continental bronze medal with the Russian national team, coaching the Cleveland Cavaliers to the NBA Finals and the best balance in the league the following season, winning the EuroCup with Darussafaka (with Scottie Wilbekin and Ante Zizic), won the Eurochallenge as well as a championship and a cup in Italy.
Blatt also coached Dynamo St. Petersburg, Benetton Treviso, Efes Pilsen, Dynamo Moscow, Aris Thessaloniki, and Olympiacos. In December 2019 he announced his retirement from coaching and then was appointed as an advisor to the New York Knicks. In an activity held among Maccabi fans on Instagram last season, David Blatt was chosen by the followers as the best Maccabi coach of all time.
Born in a suburb of Boston on May 22, 1959, David Blatt began playing in his youth and became a coordinator at the prestigious Princeton College, where he earned a degree in English literature. In 1981 he arrived with the United States team for the Maccabiah Games and after winning the gold medal he made aliya.
Blatt played for Maccabi Haifa, Hapoel Jerusalem, Elitzur Netanya, Hapoel Galil Elyon, Ironi Nahariya, and Maccabi Hadera and also stood out as an active player with a special basketball IQ. In 1993 he retired due to injury and began his full-time coaching career.
Coach Blatt has also won the Italian Championship, the Italian Cup, and Super Cup with Benneton Trevisa and also achieved one of the all-time great seasons in European basketball history in the FIBA EuroCup, winning the trophy with Dynamo St. Petersburg while having a perfect 20-0 record.