“I’d like to thank the [Slovenian Basketball] Association for the honour and the trust in my ability to lead such an institution as the Slovenian national team is. As throughout my career, I’ll do my best. I’ll try to fulfil high expectations. These standards have been set by the work of former head coaches. The names of my predecessors are an extra challenge. It’s a great honour to be their successor,” said the 44-year-old Serbian expert, who visited Slovenia during the break during NBA League’s All Stars weekend.
Assistant coach at Utah Jazz also emphasized he was aware of the pressure and high expectations, stating that meant an additional challenge: “Slovenia has a long tradition and I’m aware of that. I came to Slovenia for two reasons now. Oh the one hand, I wanted to show my respect for the fans of basketball. I can’t be here much because of my work in the USA. The other reason is a meeting with co-workers from the Slovenian Basketball Association. We have a strenuous weekend ahead. We also keep in touch every day.”
Slovenian basketball has a very good reputation in the USA
Once a very promising basketball player from Belgrade, Kokoškov was forced to end his career very early due to a serious injury in a traffic accident, becoming a coach assistant instead at a young age. For the past 17 years, he has worked in the USA, where he’s been in the NBL League since the year 2000. He joined the team of Utah Jazz in 2015, and the idea of his role as Slovenia’s head coach was initially not too well received: “They [the Utah Jazz] were not satisfied at first, because we have a young team. They expect me to work a lot and to work hard, but they realised that this was also a great honour for Utah. People know Slovenian basketball well – it has a very good reputation in the USA. This is a result of years and years of work and the basketball players who represented it in the NBA. My friends from the world of basketball congratulated me and complimented me for becoming the Slovenian head coach.”
Tilen Jamnik, translated by K. Z.
