GBC to Content Writer: Career Shift

Two former Gipuzkoa Basket coaches, who are part of the club’s history, have found accommodation or will do so shortly. One is Porfirio Fisac ​​de Diego, who has committed to San Pablo Burgos after the dismissal of Brazilian Bruno Savignani. The Segovian will make his debut this weekend against Unicaja de Málaga at the Martín Carpena, a very complicated place to start his career on the right foot. The other coach is Pablo Laso, who is very close to an agreement with Anadolu Efes of Istanbul, who fired Igor Kokoskov a few weeks ago and is looking for someone with the cachet and experience of the Gasteiztarran to right the course in the Turkish league where he is third and in the Euroleague, where he occupies seventeenth position.

Two historic coaches in the GBC; that of Fuenterrebollo because he is the only one who has two promotions to the ACB behind him, that unforgettable one in 2006 and another in 2016, and the second because he is the only one who has never been relegated from the ACB with the southern frog team. Laso spent four seasons in Donostia before signing for Real Madrid – with whom he collected 22 titles – in the first he promoted the team and in the other three he remained in the Endesa League. After Pablo Laso’s journey, Sito Alonso arrived in the summer of 2011.

Fisac ​​was without a team since he was fired from Casademont Zaragoza last May. He has accumulated fourteen seasons in the Endesa League and in addition to coaching Gipuzkoa Basket, Fisac ​​has been on the benches of Valladolid, Fuenlabrada, Gran Canaria and two stages (as in Gipuzkoa Basket) in Zaragoza. San Pablo Burgos, bottom of the ACB league, will be his sixth team. In the Burgos team he will work side by side with the Asturian Jorge Álvarez, who was Lolo Encinas’ assistant for two seasons when the San Sebastian coached the Illunbe squad.

San Pablo Burgos is bottom of the ACB with only one win, tied with Covirán Granada, and is two away from the first to be saved from the burning, Morabanc Andorra.

In search of the reaction

In the case of Pablo Laso, the Vitorian coach was without a team every time Baskonia decided to break the contract that linked the two parties last summer. Laso is working as a commentator on Dazn and it seems that he has received a succulent offer from Anadolu Efes. There is nothing official yet but it seems that the offer has been able to convince Laso, who rejected several benches after his departure from Baskonia became known, late in the summer.

Anadolu, one of the Euroleague classics, has not started well. They have Vincent Poirier, whom Laso trained at Real Madrid, out, but they have high-end players such as Shane Larkin, Jordan Loyd, Rodrigue Beaubois, Roland Smits, Ercan Osmano and Kai Jones.

If the former Gipuzkoa Basket coach finally signs for the Ottoman team, it will be his second adventure abroad after the one he had in the 2023/24 season in the ranks of Bayern Munich. Laso won the German league and cup with the Bavarian team, before leaving and signing for Baskonia.