Nikita Leonidowitsch Morgunow

Nikita Morgunov
Player information
Full name	Nikita Leonidowitsch Morgunow
birthday	June 29, 1975
place of birth	Novokuznetsk, Soviet Union
size	211 cm
position	center
Club information
society	Spartak Primorye
league	Superleague Russia
Jersey number	29
Clubs as active
1993–1997 PBK CSKA Moscow 1997–1998 KK Atletas Kaunas 1999–2000 Portland Trail Blazers 2000–2002 CSKA Moscow 2002 Awtodor Saratow 2002–2003 MBK Dynamo Moscow 2003–2004 Makedonikos 2004–2007 Dynamo Oblast Moscow 2007–2008 BK Chimki 2008–2010 Locomotive Rostov / Kuban Krasnodar 2010–2011 Universitet Yugra Surgut 2012–2013 MBK Dynamo Moscow Since 2013 Spartak Primorye 00000 0
National team
1996-2008	Russia

Nikita Leonidowitsch Morgunow medal table
Basketball (men)
Russia
World Championship
silver	1998 Athens
European Championship
gold	2007 Spain

Nikita Leonidowitsch Morgunow ( Russian: Никита Леонидович Моргунов ; born June 29, 1975 in Novokuznetsk , RSFSR ) is a Russian basketball player . Morgunow was four times Russian champion at the beginning of his career with PBK CSKA from Moscow in the 90s and celebrated his greatest successes with the Russian national team, with which he became vice world champion in 1998 and European champion in 2007.

Career

Morgunow came in 1993 from the Aleko club from Stavropol as a young player to the Russian series champion CSKA Moscow, with whom he subsequently won four championship titles and took third place in the FIBA Euroleague in 1996. In 1997 he moved to Lithuania to KK Atletas from Kaunas , where he played with the Lithuanian "old star" Rimas Kurtinaitis , among others . At the successful 1998 World Cup , in the course of which the Russian national team defeated both the Lithuanian national basketball team and the US selection without an NBA player in the quarter and semi-finals , Morgunov only made short appearances for the national team. Nevertheless, the NBA club Portland Trail Blazers , who already had the Lithuanian center Arvydas Sabonis in Morgunow's playing position , signed him several times over various periods from January 1999 to November 2000 without using him in a championship game.

In the 2000/01 season Morgunow returned to Europe first to his former club CSKA. In the once played Suproleague , ZSKA reached fourth place, with Morgunow in the game for third place a double-double with 16 points and 12 rebounds . In both 2001 and 2002, CSKA lost its first and only two Russian championship titles to Ural Great Perm . In January 2002 Morgunow moved to Avtodor in Saratov , for whom he wanted to play before he switched to the Trail Blazers. Avtodor defeated his old club CSKA in the first play-off round and was eliminated in the semifinals against defending champion Ural Great. For the 2002/03 season he returned to Moscow , but played for MBK Dynamo , the old local rivals of CSKA, which was re-established in 2001 and played the first season after his return to the Russian top division. In the championship play-offs they lost in the first round against defending champions Ural Great, who in turn had to admit defeat in the final CSKA series. In the 2003/04 season Morgunow played in the Greek A1 Ethniki with Makedonikos from Kozani . In the European club competition ULEB Cup 2003/04 they were eliminated in the round of 16 when they lost in a record-breaking way a lead of 26 points from the first leg with a 58:90 at the Spanish club Caprabo Lleida .

In 2004 he returned to Russia and received a contract with Dynamo from Moscow Oblast , which is based in the Moscow suburb of Lyubertsy . With this club he reached the play-offs for the Russian championship three times, each of which was eliminated in the first round. In 2007 the club was renamed Triumph and Morgunov's current contract was dissolved. After winning the European basketball championship in 2007 with the Russian national team, he signed a contract with another Moscow suburb club from Khimki . With BK Chimki he reached the final series of the Russian championship, which again went out in favor of CSKA Moscow. In the Russian Cup competition in 2008, however, they remained victorious in the final against CSKA. At Chimki Morgunow did not get the chance as desired, but was still nominated for the 2008 Olympic team and moved to the Rostov locomotive club for the 2008/09 season . In the play-off quarter-final series 2008/09, in which Lokomotive lost to Morgunov's previous club Chimki, he tore a cruciate ligament and fell out for months. The club itself was transferred to Krasnodar as the Kuban locomotive .

For the 2010/11 season, Morgunov did not get a new contract and finally signed with Universitet Yugra from Surgut in the Superleague Russia, which has now become second-rate due to the establishment of the Professionalnaja Basketbolnaja League . Universitet Yugra finished the main round first, but lost the final series of the play-offs against Spartak Primorye , who are promoted to the PBL after the exclusion of MBK Dynamo. In the 2012/13 season Morgunow joined Dynamo Moscow when they returned to the Superleague, but were eliminated at the end of the season in the first play-off round. With Spartak Primorye from Vladivostok on the Pacific and his former national team colleague Pyotr Samojlenko , Morgunov reached the play-off semi-final series of the Superleague again in the 2013/14 season, which however was lost to the eventual overall winner Avtodor.

National team

After Morgunov was initially only used in qualifying games from 1996, he was nominated for the final squad of the Russian men's selection at the 1998 World Basketball Championship in 1998 . Morgunow only got a lot of playing time in the clearly won opening game against Japan , but with 28 minutes he was on the field longer than any other of his teammates. Otherwise he only got short appearances of less than ten minutes per game. After a narrow preliminary round defeat in extra time against European champions BR Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) , they won all games in the intermediate round and defeated the Olympic medalist Lithuania in the quarter-finals and the United States national basketball team in the semi-finals without NBA professionals . In the final they met again on Yugoslavia, against which they lost just two points after a half-time lead.

Morgunov's next participation in the finals was at the 2000 Olympic Games . Due to the poor direct comparison , they took fourth place in the preliminary group and, after being eliminated in the quarter-finals against the defending champion from the USA who competed with NBA professionals and later again successful, they finished eighth. At the EM 2001 , after two successful games including a high victory over the Greek national basketball team, they were practically qualified for the final round and lost the last preliminary round game. But then they also lost the quarter-finals against the later bronze medalist Spain and after two wins in the placement round saved fifth place and qualification for the 2002 World Cup .

At the 2002 World Cup they met in the preliminary round on the eventual finalists Argentina and the surprise team of the World Cup and later semi-finalists New Zealand and lost both games. After they had made it to the intermediate round, they lost to hosts United States and the later bronze medalist Germany and were eliminated. In the EM 2003 , in which Russia gambled away participation in the 2004 Olympic Games , Morgunov did not take part. At the finals of the EM 2005 he was represented in the national jersey again and Russia initially won the two opening games in a convincing manner, so that they were practically qualified for the final round before the last preliminary round match. This was lost with one point against the eventual finalist Germany and then again a quarter-finals, this time against the eventual European champions Greece. After losing the games in the placement round and taking eighth place, they were also not qualified for the 2006 World Cup.

At the EM 2007 Morgunow was represented again in the team of the new national coach David Blatt and they won all preliminary round games and also in the newly introduced intermediate round they lost only one game, but clearly with over ten points difference against hosts Spain. In the final against the tournament favorites Spain, however, they won with a point in the final minute and secured the title. He was nominated again for the 2008 Olympic team and thus took part in the only two Olympic tournaments of the Russian national team after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the participation of the United Team in 1992. This is ahead of some of the better-known Russian basketball players of the 1990s, such as Vasily Karassev and Sergei Babkov , who never competed in the Olympics. At the Olympic Games in 2008 , however, the European champions' performance was disappointing. After only one preliminary round victory, they were eliminated early.

Web links

• Morgunov, NIKITA - Statistics on the websites of the ULEB ( English )
• archive.fiba.com: Players - Nikita MORGUNOV (RUS) - Overview of participation in FIBA tournaments (English)
• Nikita Morgunov Basketball Player Profile, stats, biography, career - player profile on eurobasket.com (English)
• Nikita Morgunov in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Nikita Morgunov, CSKA Moscow (Russia), News, Stats, Rumors, Awards - RealGM. RealGM.com, accessed November 1, 2011 . 
2. ↑ PHASE PAGES, Eighthfinals 2003-04. (No longer available online.) Eurocupbasketball.com, archived from the original on August 23, 2011 ; accessed on November 1, 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.