Constantin Popa ( he, קונסטנטין פופה; born February 18, 1971) is a Romanian-Israeli professional

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

coach and former player.

Biography

Popa played for

Dinamo Bucharest A dynamo is a magnetic device originally used as an electric generator. Dynamo or Dinamo may also refer to: Places * Dinamo (Moscow Metro), a station of the Moscow Metro, Moscow, Russia * Dinamo (Yekaterinburg Metro), a station of the Yekaterin ...

in his native Romania before going overseas to play

college basketball In United States colleges, top-tier basketball is governed by collegiate athletic bodies including National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), the United States Collegiate Athleti ...

in the United States for the

University of Miami The University of Miami (UM, UMiami, Miami, U of M, and The U) is a private research university in Coral Gables, Florida. , the university enrolled 19,096 students in 12 colleges and schools across nearly 350 academic majors and programs, incl ...

. The tallest person ever to play for the Hurricanes, he was twice a third team All-

Big East The Big East Conference is a collegiate athletic conference that competes in NCAA Division I in ten men's sports and twelve women's sports. Headquartered in New York City, the eleven full-member schools are primarily located in Northeast and ...

selection. In large part on the strength of a highly effective

hook shot In basketball, a hook shot is a play in which the offensive player, usually turned perpendicular to the basket, gently throws the ball with a sweeping motion of the arm farther from the basket in an upward arc with a follow-through which ends ov ...

, he was selected by the L.A. Clippers with the 53rd pick in the

1995 NBA draft The 1995 NBA draft took place on June 28, 1995, at SkyDome in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It marked the first NBA draft to be held outside the United States and was the first draft for the two Canadian expansion teams, Toronto Raptors and Vancouve ...

. In the same year he was selected by the

Miami Tropics Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a coastal metropolis and the county seat of Miami-Dade County in South Florida, United States. With a population of 442,241 at the ...

of the

USBL The United States Basketball League (USBL) was a professional men's spring basketball league. The league was formed in 1985 and ceased operations in 2008. The USBL started in 1985 as one of the first basketball leagues to play a late-spring to ...

as a first round territorial selection (4th pick overall). He never ended up playing a game in either league, although he did play for the Florida Beachdogs of the American CBA, where he developed somewhat of a cult fan following. He also played in France with Pau-Orthez and with

Maccabi Tel Aviv Maccabi Tel Aviv ( he, מכבי תל אביב) is one of the largest sports clubs in Israel, and a part of the Maccabi association. Many sports clubs and teams in Tel Aviv are in association with Maccabi and compete in a variety of sports, such ...

and

Hapoel Jerusalem Hapoel Jerusalem is a sport organization in Jerusalem as a local branch of the Hapoel movement. The branch was established in the 1920s and represents the city in more sports than any other sport organization in Jerusalem. Today, the club's leadi ...

of Israel. Although not Jewish, he obtained

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

i citizenship as his wife is Jewish. Popa retired from professional basketball in 2001. He served 4 seasons as assistant coach of the University of Indianapolis Greyhound Women's basketball team, before becoming head coach in April 2011. Popa served five seasons as coach of the Greyhounds, compiling a record of 83–66. He was relieved of his duties in March 2016. In 2019, he was inducted into the University of Miami Sports Hall of Fame.

Awards and achievements

*Romanian Junior National Team – 87–90 *Romanian National Team – 87–92 *European Championships – 87 *

FIBA U18 European Championship The FIBA U18 European Championship, originally known as the European Championship for Juniors, is a youth men's basketball competition that was inaugurated with the 1964 edition. It was held biennially through the 2002 edition. From the 2004 e ...

4th – 90 *Big East Conf. 3rd Team – 93, 95 *French ProA Champion – 96 *Israeli League Champion – 97, 98, 99, 00 *Israeli Cup Winner – 98, 99, 00 *Euroleague Finalist –

2000 File:2000 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Protests against Bush v. Gore after the 2000 United States presidential election; Heads of state meet for the Millennium Summit; The International Space Station in its infant form as seen from ...

*Israeli State Cup Finalist – 01 *Israeli League Finalist – 01

References

External links

Constantin Popa bio
at hurricanesports.com

at sports-reference.com 1971 births Living people Centers (basketball) Élan Béarnais players Expatriate sportspeople in Israel Florida Beachdogs players Hapoel Jerusalem B.C. players Indianapolis Greyhounds women's basketball coaches Israeli Basketball Premier League players Los Angeles Clippers draft picks Maccabi Tel Aviv B.C. players Miami Hurricanes men's basketball players Romanian expatriate basketball people in the United States Romanian expatriate sportspeople in the United States Romanian expatriate sportspeople in France Romanian expatriate sportspeople in Israel Romanian men's basketball players Romanian people of Israeli descent Basketball players from Bucharest {{Romania-basketball-bio-stub