Milko Bjelica

Milko Bjelica
Player information
birthday	4th June 1984
place of birth	Belgrade, SFR Yugoslavia
size	207 cm
position	Power Forward / Center
Club information
society	Anadolu Efes SK
league	Türkiye Basketbol Ligi
Clubs as active
2001–2006 KK Roter Stern Belgrade 2006–2007 NewYorker Phantoms 2007–2008 Köln 99ers 2008–2011 Lietuvos rytas Vilnius 2011–2013 Caja Laboral Kutxa Since 2014 KK Roter Stern Belgrade 0
National team
Since 02008	Montenegro

Milko Bjelica ( Serbian - Cyrillic Милко Бьелица ; born June 4, 1984 in Belgrade ) is a Montenegrin basketball player . After playing for Roter Stern in his hometown until 2006 , he then played for two years in the German basketball league . He then played for three years with the Lithuanian club BC Lietuvos rytas from Vilnius , with whom he achieved a "quadruple" in 2009 with titles in national championships and cups, the Baltic Basketball League and the ULEB Eurocup . After another double in 2010, he played from 2011 for two and a half years for the Basque club Caja Laboral in the Spanish ACB league . At the beginning of 2014 he then moved to Türkiye Basketbol Ligi for Anadolu Efes SK.

Career

Bjelica played from the 2001/02 season in the first team of Red Star Belgrade in the highest Serbian-Montenegrin league. A year later he also made his debut in the supranational Adriatic League after the teams of Serbia-Montenegro were admitted there. With Red Star he won the national cup twice in 2004 & 2006 and reached the final of the 2006 championship, which was lost to local rival and defending champion KK Partizan Belgrade . In the ULEB Cup 2006 they reached the quarter-finals, which were lost to the eventual title winner MBK Dynamo Moscow .

For the 2006/07 BBL season Bjelica moved to the New York Phantoms in the German Bundesliga in Braunschweig , who had signed the Bosnian coach Emir Mutapčić at the same time . The desired turnaround for the bottom of the table in the previous season, who had only kept the class by increasing the league, could only be achieved to a limited extent; Although they had nothing to do with relegation, the play-off places could clearly not be reached. For the following BBL season 2007/08 Bjelica switched to the league competitor and reigning cup winner 99ers from Cologne . The Cologne-based company had to cope with the loss of its main sponsor and had to file for bankruptcy in January 2008. While many of the foreign professionals left the club, Bjelica played the season with Cologne to the end, who lost their chances of a play-off place due to the resulting turmoil.

For the 2008/09 season Bjelica moved to the Lithuanian capital Vilnius to BC Lietuvos rytas, with whom he ultimately remained victorious in all competitions in which the club participated. In the following season, by winning the ULEB Cup and the championship, they were also eligible to play in the top European division ULEB Euroleague 2009/10 , where they just failed to make it into the intermediate round of the sixteen best teams. This was achieved in the ULEB Euroleague 2010/11 , in which the quarter-finals were already within reach when they lost the last and decisive intermediate round match at home to Caja Laboral, who thereby overtook the Lithuanians. At the national level, too, they were inferior to their "eternal rival" Žalgiris Kaunas in the championship and cup in that season.

His first participation in the finals for the Montenegrin national basketball team was the 2011 European Championship finals in Lithuania. After a win in extra time in the opening game against their regional rivals Macedonia , who made it into the semi-finals as a surprise team during the tournament, Montenegro lost all four remaining games and were eliminated in the preliminary round. For the following season, his Montenegrin compatriot Duško Ivanović , coach of Caja Laboral, had already brought him to the Spanish ACB league in July 2011 . After the end of his two-year contract, Bjelica did not get a new contract until the end of the year in November 2013. After the end of this contract he was signed by the Turkish top club Anadolu Efes SK from Istanbul , which like Laboral Kutxa is still represented in the round of the 16 best teams in the highest European club competition ULEB Euroleague 2013/14 .

family

His older sister Milka (* 1981) is also a Montenegrin selection player.

Web links

Commons : Milko Bjelica  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• BJELICA, MILKO - Statistics on the websites of the ULEB ( English )
• archive.fiba.com: Players - Milko BJELICA (MNE) - Overview of participation in FIBA tournaments (English)
• ACB: Milko Bjelica - player profile on the websites of the Liga ACB ( Spanish )
• easyCredit BBL - Milko Bjelica - player profile on the easyCredit Basketball-Bundesliga website
• Milko Bjelica - NLB League ABA - Player profile on the sides of the Adriatic Basketball Association (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Cologne 99ers are insolvent. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , January 22, 2008, accessed on September 24, 2011 . 
2. ↑ CAJA LABORAL signs Bjelica for 2 years. (No longer available online.) ULEB , July 26, 2011, archived from the original on January 2, 2014 ; accessed on September 24, 2011 (English, press release). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
3. ↑ ANADOLU EFES tabs big man Milko Bjelica. (No longer available online.) ULEB January 2, 2014, archived from the original on January 2, 2014 ; accessed on January 2, 2014 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.