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VIDEO AND AUDIO ⟩ Six thousand Latvians “straight” from “Positivus” to Tallinn: the historic silver of the U-20 team basketball players – Basketball

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Latvian U-20 basketball team on the evening of July 21, 2013 in Tallinn. PHOTO: Ieva Luka/LETA

Exactly nine years ago, on July 21, 2013, Latvian U-20 national team basketball players wrote their names in the history book of domestic basketball with golden (silver) letters. For the first time, one of the Latvian youth national teams played in the final of the European Championship, where they lost to the Italians. This did not diminish the value of what was achieved. How did this silver team form?

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At the 2012 European Championship, the 20-year-old national team was represented by a talented group of players born in 1992, who had to do without undoubtedly the biggest star Dāvja Bertān. The boys born in 1992 won bronze in the European U-18 national team tournament in 2010, and in 2011 they showed their talents to the Riga audience at the World Cup for U-19 teams.

In 2012, the head coach of the U-20 national team, Robert Stelmacher, had only half of the twelve players who won the U-18 bronze two years ago. Dāvis Bertāns and Kaspars Vecvagars were at the disposal of Ainars Bagatskis in the adult national team, while Edmunds Dukulis had gone to university in the USA.

With four born in 1993 in the lineup (Jānis Bērziņš, Ojārs Siliņš, Elvis Saulītis, Klāvs Strazdiņš) the sixth place in Europe was won, which was not an easy achievement. Stelmacher was supposed to continue working with the junior team in 2013 as well, but it did not happen.

As told to KLIK by experts of the Latvian Basketball Association (LBS) at that time, Štelmaher was not recommended to work with the U-20 national team in the summer…

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