Legendary Serbian basketball coach Dusan Ivkovic, who led the former Yugoslavia to the 1990 world championship, has died at the age of 77.
In his famous coaching career, Ivkovic won two EuroLeague titles with Greek club Olympiakos.
Serbian basketball federation said Ivkovic died on Thursday. Serbian media reported that the suspect died of lung failure in a hospital in Belgrade.
In 1990, shortly before Yugoslavia’s civil war and dissolution, Ivkovic led the “white dream team” to the world championship in Argentina.
The team consisted of many future NBA stars, including Drazen Petrovic and Vlade Divac. Ivkovic’s team beat the United States, led by Mike Krzyzewski, 99-91 in the semifinals – the last time the Americans faced a team of college players in a major tournament.
During his 46-year managerial career, Ivkovic led multiple club teams, including Partizan Belgrade, CSKA Moscow and five different Greek teams, winning more than a dozen titles.
Besides the world title, Ivkovic led his home country to a silver medal at the 1988 Seoul Olympics and three EuroBasket continental titles. He later coached the Serbian national team.
He retired in 2016 after being the technical director of Anadolu Efes.
Known as Duda, Ivkovic was inducted into the FIBA Hall of Fame in 2017 and was named a EuroLeague Basketball Legend that same year.
“Rest in peace Duda!” FIBA EuroBasket wrote on Twitter.
After his retirement, Ivkovic remained active as a coach for Belgrade’s local basketball team Radnicki, where he started as a player in 1958.
“Basketball is not part of my life,” Ivkovic once said, “this is my life.”
