Mindaugas Lukauskis

Mindaugas Lukauskis
Player information
birthday	May 19, 1979
place of birth	Panevėžys, Soviet Union
size	198 cm
position	Small forward
Club information
society	Lietkabelis Panevėžys
league	LKL
Clubs as active
1996–2001 KK Panevėžys 2001–2002 Sakalai Vilnius 2002–2003 Alita Alytus 2003–2009 Lietuvos rytas Vilnius 2009–2010 ASVEL Lyon-Villeurbanne 2010–2011 EWE Baskets Oldenburg 2011–2012 Basket Barcellona 2012 Valencia Basket Club 2013 Tofaş SK Bursa 2013 Bilbao Basket 2013–2014 TonyBet Prienai 2014–2016 Lietuvos rytas Vilnius Since 2016 Lietkabelis Panevėžys 00000 00000 00000 0
National team
2005-2011	Lithuania

Mindaugas Lukauskis (born May 19, 1979 in Panevėžys , Lithuanian SSR ) is a Lithuanian basketball player who participated in the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing with the Lithuanian national team . In contrast to many of his national team colleagues, Lukauskis was initially only active in his home country and with BC Lietuvos rytas also celebrated two ULEB Eurocup triumphs at international level. It was not until 2009 that he moved to ASVEL in France at the age of 30, and one season later he played for EWE Baskets from Oldenburg in Germany . After playing in Italy , Spain and Turkey , he returned to his home country in 2013.

Career

Lukauskis was initially only active for the local basketball club in his hometown and, at the age of 22, moved to KK Sakalai in the capital Vilnius in 2001 . After one season he moved to BC Alita to Alytus and was finally committed in 2003 by the Lithuanian top club BC Lietuvos rytas, who dominated the Lithuanian league together with rival Žalgiris Kaunas . With this club he became Lithuanian champion in 2006, after having won the ULEB Cup in 2005. BC Žalgiris was also able to defeat BC Žalgiris in the 2006 final for the first time in the Baltic Basketball League , which was founded in 2004 and is also dominated by the two top Lithuanian clubs. The title in the Baltic League could be defended in 2007, but you had to leave the championship in the national league BC Žalgiris again. In the ULEB Cup they reached the final again, which was lost to Real Madrid . In the 2007/08 season, the finals in the national championship, cup and Baltic league were lost against BC Žalgiris, but in the top European division ULEB Euroleague, after winning the group in the preliminary round, the intermediate round of the best sixteen teams was once again reached, what was also successful in 2006. Under the new coach Rimas Kurtinaitis , they triumphed in all competitions in the 2008/09 season and won the triple of championship, cup and Baltic league as well as the ULEB Eurocup at European level.

Then moved Lukauskis 2009 for the first time abroad for the French champions ASVEL from Lyon in the LNB Pro A . The title defense in the championship did not succeed, but they won the French league cup Semaine de As in 2010 . In the BBL season 2010/11 Lukauskis played in the German basketball league for EWE Baskets. With the Oldenburgers he was eliminated in the play-off quarter-finals for the national championship against Alba Berlin after five games. For the 2011/12 season he then signed a contract with the Italian second division team Sigma Barcellona in the Sicilian Barcellona Pozzo di Gotto . After a season in which they were eliminated in the play-off semi-final series for promotion, he moved to the Spanish ACB league for the Valencia Basket Club after an injury to Thomas Kelati at the beginning of the 2012/13 season, which was defeated in the ULEB Eurocup in 2012 after the final against BK Chimki again in this international competition. The fixed-term contract was not extended after one month. At the end of January 2013 he got a contract in the Türkiye Basketbol Ligi with Tofaş from Bursa . After another monthly contract at the beginning of the 2013/14 season with Dominion Basket from Bilbao , Lukauskis returned to his home country in November 2013 and played for the TonyBet club from Prienai . While you were eliminated in the national championship in the semi-finals of the play-offs from the awarding of the title, you reached the final of the Baltic Basketball League , which was lost in a round-trip against the national competitor KK Šiauliai . For the 2014/15 season Lukauskis returned once more to Lietuvos rytas in the capital, but with whom he remained without a win in the final series of the Lithuanian championship against defending champion Žalgiris Kaunas. Previously, they were eliminated in the 2014/15 Eurocup in the round of 16 against Turkish club Pınar Karşıyaka SK . In the following Eurocup 2015/16 they achieved only two wins in ten games in the preliminary round and were eliminated early. After you could win the new national cup competition Karaliaus Mindaugo taurė , you failed in the play-offs of the championship in the semifinals to Neptūnas Klaipėda and finished just third in the Lithuanian championship like two years earlier.

Lukauskis and Kšyštof Lavrinovič moved to Lietkabelis from Panevėžys for the 2016/17 season , who had received a wildcard to participate in the 2016/17 EuroCup .

National team

For the European basketball championship 2005 Lukauskis was appointed for the first time in a final squad of the Lithuanian national team. After winning the group in the preliminary round, they lost their only game in the quarter-finals against France , which had surprisingly defeated hosts Serbia and Montenegro after two defeats in the preliminary round in a round of hope . In the placement games for 5th place, they remained victorious against the preliminary round group winners Russia and Slovenia, who were affected by a similar fate .

At the Olympic Games in 2008 Lukauskis was once again in the final squad. After winning the group in the preliminary round with a victory over defending champions Argentina, they lost to world champions Spain in the semi-finals . In the game for the bronze medal, they finally lost to Argentina and finished fourth.

The following European basketball championship in 2009 in neighboring Lithuania, Poland, ended with a great disappointment for the Lithuanians, who were otherwise always considered medal candidates, when, after two opening defeats against Turkey and the Polish hosts in the second round, they played all three games against the eventual finalists Spain and Serbia as well lost to Slovenia and was eliminated before the quarter-finals after only one preliminary round victory against Bulgaria .

Lukauskis was the last player to be removed from the provisional squad for the 2010 World Cup in Turkey and the 2011 European Championship in his own country.

Web links

• LUKAUSKIS, MINDAUGAS - player profile on the websites of the EuroLeague (English)
• Mindaugas Lukauskis - Overview of participation in international FIBA tournaments on archive.fiba.com (English)
• easyCredit BBL - Mindaugas Lukauskis - player profile on the easyCredit Basketball-Bundesliga website

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Mindaugas Lukauskis - Lyon-Villeurbanne - Joueurs - Pro A. Ligue Nationale de Basket , accessed on December 19, 2013 (French, player profile). 
2. ↑ Legadue Basket: Mindaugas Lukauskis. Legadue , accessed December 19, 2013 (Italian, player profile). 
3. ↑ ACB.COM: M. Lukauskis. Liga ACB , accessed January 2, 2013 (Spanish, player profile). 
4. ↑ Kemzura cuts Lukauskis and Eitutavicius, names final squad. (No longer available online.) TalkBasket.net, August 22, 2010, formerly in the original ; accessed on September 4, 2011 .  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.    
5. ↑ Darjus Lavrinovic, Mindaugas Lukauskis out of Lithuania's squad for EuroBasket. (No longer available online.) LithuaniaBasketball.com, August 27, 2011, archived from the original on September 25, 2011 ; accessed on September 4, 2011 . 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.