By Cesare Milanti / info@eurohoops.net
We’re used to dealing with basketball people who have never had a “Plan B”, or at least they were combining two sides of their beings only up until a certain young age. That’s why stories like Francesco Tabellini’s bring out a sort of uniqueness in such a landscape.
Until he was 30, his daily routine wasn’t only moving around that orange ball. Spending time around Virtus Bologna’s developing youth system, he also had to compensate with teaching at school.
He did it all from middle school up to high school, following on his classical and philology studies at university by taking Greek and Latin classes, but also geography, Italian, and history. Each of his two worlds, however, obviously reduced valuable time to the other, in a never-ending annoying cycle.
He gave himself a summer of thoughts in 2014, and that’s when Treviso popped out around the corner. The team’s youth system had to be fully renovated once the new basketball era started in the Italian town. And he made sure everything was done well enough.
The U20 Italian League won in 2018 at the end of a perfect and complete revolution could have been the beginning of a new chapter for Francesco Tabellini, opening the gates for a brighter future in Italy. “Somebody gets the opportunity of being noted, somebody doesn’t”, he said to Eurohoops.
After taking part in Stefano Pillastrini and Max Menetti’s coaching staff, everything changed again in 2022. “I dreamed of being Treviso’s head coach. But the club decided to go in a different direction. I tried to take it as an opportunity”, he recalled. Two years ago, his life took an unexpected turn.
How does an Italian find himself in Czech?
Francesco Tabellini has always been ambitious about becoming a head coach in the future. He knew he had the skills, and he modeled his idea of basketball behind certain kind of references.
First, he had an Italian-minded approach thanks to his mentors. In Bologna, he formed himself with Giordano Consolini, assistant coach of Ettore Messina when in Virtus; in Treviso, Stefano Pillastrini and Max Menetti were the ones to look up to.
As the latter is currently in Kaunas working on Andrea Trinchieri’s coaching staff, he always wanted to shape a European basketball identity for the ones who followed him. That’s what took Tabellini out of his comfort zone when it came to growing his basketball knowledge.
“I started watching leagues abroad, especially the German BBL. I loved how Tuomas Iisalo in Cralsheim and Johan Roijakkers in Gottingen made their teams play. I kept asking myself if that way of playing the game could have been brought to Italy too”, he reflected.
When the Dutch coach moved to Varese and successfully brought the same idea, he had his answers clear. “Pace, space, and race: that’s the kind of basketball I like my team to play”, Tabellini added.
But let’s get back to that rejection turned into an opportunity. In 2022, Treviso was no longer an option, nor were other Italian clubs that didn’t trust his ideas enough. That was the summer when his basketball network came out helpful.
Jakub Kudlacek, now an International scout for the Charlotte Hornets and former playmaker of several Italian teams, was the link for a working opportunity at USK Prague. That was the call he needed.
Despite building a team only around Czech players coming from the club’s youth system and choosing only two American rookies (PJ Pipes and Mike Okauru), they went all the way to the league’s Quarter-Finals, facing the powerhouse Nymburk. That’s another turnaround of Francesco Tabellini’s story.
Looking up to Nymburk even before moving to Prague, he wanted his team to play with a similar kind of identity on the court, moving up the pace, having more possessions, and a flowing motion on offense. Such basketball philosophy, once a pattern for the Czech powerhouse, disappeared in 2022-23.
“We had a good Quarter-Final series against them, winning twice in Nymburk”, the Italian head coach said about USK Prague’s run. “I was already in Czech and they saw which kind of basketball I wanted my team to express. Probably, they were curious”, he added.
Most importantly, that season became the year of Nymburk’s nightmares. While collecting only a 2-4 record in the Basketball Champions League, they didn’t win the domestic NBL for the first time in 19 years. By eliminating them in the Semi-Finals and then lifting the trophy, Opava broke the streak.
“They identified the reasons for such delusional loss in losing their own identity. When I watched them – the years when they reached the BCL Final Eight with Oren Amiel and players like Zach Hankins, Hayden Dalton, Retin Obasohan, Jerrick Harding, Colbey Ross -, they played totally different”, he said.
The consequence was easy to predict. Former Nymburk’s General Manager Ondrej Simacek was on the other line to propose coach Tabellini to move away from Prague. Picking up the phone, there was a “yes”.
Adjusting by puzzling Nymburk’s success
The first adjustment he needed to make had nothing to do with basketball. Moving from a metropolitan capital like Prague to the thermal village of Podebrady, where the whole team stays, wasn’t an easy task.
Moreover, in Czech loving a sport means following football and most importantly ice hockey. “In Prague, we had 1.000-1.200 fans per game. Once, I went to watch ice hockey: there were 17.000 people in the stands. Once winter comes and little lakes get frozen, everybody starts playing it”, he remembered.
Trying to build a beloved fanbase in Nymburk following the blueprints of an environment like Kaunas with Zalgiris, his first goal was bringing back a fast-flowing identity to the organization.
As the Czech domestic league doesn’t concede a lot of resting time, with games on weekdays too, it was important to shape the team’s playstyle in Europe too. Last season, his first in Nymburk, the approach to the FIBA Europe Cup was admirable: 9-3 between the Regular Season and the Top 16.
After overcoming huge obstacles like Saragoza, Manisa, and Gravelines, in the Quarter-Finals it was time to face Varese. For the first time ever, Francesco Tabellini had to clash against an Italian team.
“It was emotional and very satisfying. We were lacking two Americans, we had four players returning from the national team and [Jaromir] Bohacik wasn’t feeling well. But we didn’t even play our best-branded basketball. Varese deserved to win, during that period they were playing amazingly and they had just added Nico Mannion”, he recalled.
The season still finished with some golden hardware, bringing ERA Nymburk where it belonged. The championship run, characterized by a 12-piece puzzle filled after each victory, saw the powerhouse losing only one game to Usti n/Labem in the Finals, where Ty Gordon grabbed the Finals MVP.
Returning to the Basketball Champions League was coming next, and supposedly from the biggest door. However, as BK Opava suffered six straight blowout defeats with an average conceded 30-point differential, the country dropped down in the country. ERA Nymburk had to qualify from the backline.
Is this a new Basketball Champions League Cinderella?
Attracting talent to Czech isn’t the easiest of tasks. That’s why Francesco Tabellini cares hugely about scouting. This season, for example, three of his players come from a season outside of the usual radars: Christian Bishop from Cyprus, Nighael Ceaser from Finland, and JT Shumate from Romania.
“I think recruiting is one of the most important things in our job. My girlfriend says I’m more stressed during the summer than during the season. And I can’t agree more on that. I don’t want to underestimate the day-to-day work: I’m proud of the team follows our identity. But you can do that only if you’re surrounded by the right people”, Tabellini said on his scouting approach.
In Nymburk, unlike in the past, he hasn’t done it alone. Alongside Czech basketball minds like Ladislav Sokolovsky and Rudolf Simacek, he also brought the talented 2005-born Serbian scout Mihajlo Markovic, who reached out to him last year on Instagram. “I liked his initiative”, he commented.
Moreover, he gave continuity to his work in Italy, giving a chance as assistant coach to the 25-year-old Giovanni Spessotto, whom he used to coach in Treviso’s youth system. “I hugely believe in giving young people chances to prove themselves. If you have unexpressed potential, you deserve to bring that out sooner than later. The same applied to me: without opportunities, I wouldn’t be here”, Tabellini said.
The staff is ultimately composed by the addition of Eduard Kotasek too, a 1998-born who just stopped playing basketball this summer. He spent last year in Slovakia after growing up as a product of Nymburk’s youth system. Another hidden gem that is boosting a young and promising core work.
Being already given the opportunity to participate in last year’s Basketball Champions League Qualification Rounds – and refusing to make the head coach’s identity take root in Nymburk -, they must have passed through that a few weeks ago if they wanted to come back to the competition.
“Initially, we were upset and disappointed. But then, like it always happens, we turned that into an opportunity to fight from the beginning. We wanted to qualify so badly that the quality of our game suffered from nervousness: low-scoring percentages, mistakes in transitions, and too many turnovers. I loved that the guys didn’t stop believing until the end”, he recalled.
Entering their ticketing game at the end of the Qualifiers in Antalya against Kalev Cramo, they were already down by 13 points (21-8) in the first quarter. Despite an intestinal virus, they stayed cohesive throughout the whole encounter. The result? 80-66 against the Estonians and BCL guaranteed.
“We wanted to enjoy this competition. And our way of enjoying things isn’t taking advantage of trips around Europe, eating new food, or discovering new places. Our way of enjoying the Basketball Champions League is winning games”, Tabellini said. There you go: first two road trips, first two wins.
Nobody would have predicted ERA Nymburk to start Group D unbeaten on top after two weeks, beating Promitheas in Patras (86-78) and Galatasaray in Istanbul (87-75) with a strong defensive identity and the beautiful side of basketball being shown on the court. “The most positive note of these two games has to be our offensive game’s smoothness”, he mentioned.
“We passed the ball a lot, we have involved everybody, and the rhythm has been great. Our offensive game isn’t extraordinary yet, but we’re on the right path. We also need to improve our half-court game, because against tough opponents you get exposed too much”, ERA Nymburk’s coach also commented.
Next up, the first home game of the season against RASTA Vechta. “I expect a very difficult game, honestly. They’re a BBL team, led by a former EuroLeague coach [Martin Schiller] and with two excellent playmakers [Justin Robinson and Tyger Campbell]. We’re exigent with ourselves and we want to win, but it will be tough. We can’t come to this game pressured by the rank of the front-runners”, he added.
In only a matter of two years, Francesco Tabellini went from being surprisingly on his way out of Treviso to gaining the respect of behind-the-scenes workers embracing the challenge in Czech, first with Prague and then with Nymburk. Crazy to think if put in perspective too: 10 years ago, his coaching career couldn’t have started in the first place, moving from the bench to the teachers’ chair.
“This start of the season could be a flower’s blossoming. You raise something, and when it blossoms, it’s prettier than what you expected before. But that’s still a flower; the best thing about our job is reaping fruits. We need to keep watering this plant well”, Francesco Tabellini concluded when asked to describe the ambitious beginning of his team’s 2024-25 campaign with a metaphor.
ERA Nymburk’s start with the umpteenth Italian head coach who’s flourishing away from his country tells you enough about balancing from “Plan A” to “Plan B” in life. You never know whose master you will become. Keep learning, and you will find someone to teach. That’s how Francesco Tabellini’s doing.
PHOTO CREDIT: Basketball Champions League
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