By John Askounis/ info@eurohoops.net
Georgios Bartzokas is a well-known and successful EuroLeague coach, but in EuroLeague’s latest Coaches Corner edition he talked about his playing years and how injuries cut it short. He admitted not being able to continue his playing career was devastating for him and that he started facing depression issues, but added that coaching allowed him to continue to be part of basketball.
“As a player, I had a lot of injuries, surgeries on my knees starting from 21 years old. And by 28, I decided to stop playing after three or four serious surgeries. It was like my first funeral. It was devastating for me. I started being depressed because of this. But day by day I realized that I couldn’t play on the level I wanted because of pain, surgeries, treatment and so on. Coaching came after, and it gave me the hope that I could continue being part of basketball in some other way” he said.
He went on: “From the age of 20, I had been coaching children’s teams, mini-basket as they called it, while I was still a player. At age 28, I became a coach of small teams in Athens, and for many years, I kept going like this. I was always serious about it, even if the level of the basketball or the competition was not so high. I was always so serious because it was my passion. I love basketball. Even now, I can watch three or four games per day.
All those kids who played with me then in Maroussi, we still get together when there’s an opportunity to see each other. They are lifetime friends from the neighborhood, and we were not even classmates. I went to another school. But in the neighborhood we were friends, and basketball was always the main thing in our life”.
Read the full Coaches Corner edition on Bartzokas at EuroLeague.net.