Drake servant

Drake servant
Player information
Full name	Drake Richard servant
birthday	December 19, 1981 (38 years 257 days)
place of birth	Fond du Lac (WI), USA
size	196 cm
position	Small Forward / Shooting Guard
college	DePaul
Clubs as active
2001–2005 DePaul Blue Demons ( NCAA ) 2006–2007 Ignis Ticino 2007–2008 Pierrel Capo d'Orlando 2008 Montepaschi Siena 2008–2009 A.IR. Avellino 2009–2011 Banco Tercas Teramo 2011–2014 Banco di Sardegna Sassari 2014–2015 Grissini Bon Reggiana 2015 Saragossa 2002 2016–2017 Orlandina 2017–2018 Vanoli Cremona 00000 00000

Drake Richard Diener (born December 19, 1981 in Fond du Lac , Wisconsin ) is a retired American basketball player . After studying in his home country, Diener turned pro in 2006, despite Crohn's disease that forced him to take a one-year break, and has so far only played for Italian clubs. After starting in the second league Legadue , Diener soon played for first-class clubs and won the Italian championship in 2008 with a brief engagement for Montepaschi Siena. In 2014 he won the Italian Cup competition with Banco di Sardegna Sassari and was elected MVP of the Lega Basket Serie A regular season .

Career

Diener went to study from his hometown to DePaul University in Chicago , where he was active from 2001 for four years for the Blue Demons university team at that time in the Conference USA (C-USA) of the NCAA . In 2004 the Blue Demons lost the final of the championship tournament against the Bearcats of the University of Cincinnati with the best season record of all teams in the C-USA . In the second round of the national NCAA finals tournament , they lost to the University of Connecticut's favorite huskies . In the last NCAA season of Diener and the last of the Blue Demons in the C-USA in 2005 these successes could not be continued. Instead, Diener was diagnosed with surgically treated Crohn's disease, which required several months of rehabilitation and called a career as a professional athlete into question.

After his rehabilitation, Diener tried his luck as a professional and signed his first contract in 2006 in the second Italian league Legadue with Ignis from Castelletto sopra Ticino in Piedmont , which only marginally improved to twelfth place at the end of the season and the play-offs for promotion clearly missed in the top division. With just under 17 points per game and a good hit rate of almost 40% for distance throws from behind the three-point line , however, he recommended himself after his first professional season as a rookie for higher tasks and, after his previous team moved to the provincial capital to Novara , was replaced by the first division club Pierrel obliged from the Sicilian Capo d'Orlando . During the season, Diener moved in February 2008 to the champion and defending champion Montepaschi from Siena in Tuscany and was replaced at Pierrel by his former teammate at the Blue Demons, Sammy Mejia . In the highest-ranking European club competition ULEB Euroleague 2007/08 , he reached the Final Four tournament with the team , where they finished third. Montepaschi was able to successfully defend his national title in the play-offs except for a single defeat in the final series.

For the 2008/09 season, Diener was won by the Italian cup winner and last year third A.IR. committed from Avellino in Campania , the Diener's former team Pierrel had defeated in their only play-off participation in the previous year, before the Sicilian team's license was withdrawn for economic reasons. With the southern Italian team, Diener took part again in the ULEB Euroleague 2008/09 , but where they were eliminated after only three wins in ten preliminary round games. Then you missed not only defending the title in the cup competition, but also making it into the play-offs for the championship in eleventh place. For the following season, Diener moved again to third last year and played for Banca Tercas from Teramo in Abruzzo . But also with this team he finished eleventh in the regular season in the 2009/10 season and was eliminated after the preliminary round of the Eurocup 2009/10 after, among other things, two narrow defeats against the later German finalist Alba Berlin . A year later it was only enough for penultimate place in the national championship in 2011, so that Teramo could only achieve relegation by paying for a wild card .

For the 2011/12 season, Drake Diener moved to last year's promoted Banco di Sardegna from Sassari in Sardinia , who with his cousin Travis Diener had qualified straight away for the play-offs for the championship. Together they won the Serie A league cup and improved to fourth place in the regular season, only to be eliminated in three games against series champion Montepaschi in the play-off semi-final series. Nevertheless, the club was qualified for a European club competition for the first time, but where they were eliminated in the Eurocup 2012/13 in the preliminary round. In the national championship, however, they reached second place in the regular season. In the first play-off round against Lenovo Cantù they won the first two games, but lost four of the following five games. After winning the Italian cup competition for the first time in the 2013/14 season in the final against defending champion Montepaschi, the team was able to defeat German champions Brose Baskets in the second group phase in the decider when they participated again in the Eurocup 2013/14 . In the knockout games of the round of 16, however, they lost again twice against the German cup winner Alba Berlin. After fourth place in the regular season they moved back to the play-off semi-final series, which this time was lost to EA7 Emporio Armani Milan . At the age of 32, Drake Diener was able to improve his personal statistics in Serie A for the fifth time in a row in the regular season and achieved almost 19 points per game, a field throw rate of over 60% and a three-point throw rate of 50% for a professional in his position fantastic odds, whereupon he was named MVP of the regular season of Serie A.

Web links

• SERVANT, DRAKE - Statistics on the websites of the ULEB ( English )
• Legabasket: Drake Diener - player profile on the websites of the Serie A ( Italian )
• Drake Diener Stats - DePaul Blue Demons - NCAA stats on statsheet.com

Individual evidence

1. ^ Lew Freedman: Demon of a time. Chicago Tribune , February 6, 2006, accessed June 12, 2014 . 
2. ↑ Luca Chiabotti: Basket, Series A: la Gazzetta vota servant. È lui l'mvp del campionato. La Gazzetta dello Sport , May 15, 2014, accessed June 12, 2014 (Italian).