Danero Axel Thomas (born 8 April 1986) is an American and Icelandic
basketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...
player who currently plays for
Breiðablik in the Icelandic
Úrvalsdeild karla. A naturalized Icelandic citizen, he debuted with the
Icelandic national basketball team in 2018.
College
Thomas played
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 ...
for
Murray State
Murray State University (MSU) is a public university in Murray, Kentucky. In addition to the main campus in Calloway County in southwestern Kentucky, Murray State operates extended campuses offering upper level and graduate courses in Paducah, ...
from 2006 to 2010. On March 19, 2010, he scored a 15-foot fadeaway shot at the buzzer, giving 13th-seeded Murray State a 66-65 victory over fourth-seeded
Vanderbilt in the first round of the
2010 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament
The 2010 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament involved 65 schools playing in a single-elimination tournament to determine the national champion of men's NCAA Division I college basketball as a culmination of the 2009–10 basketball seaso ...
.
Playing career
Thomas joined
KR prior to the 2012–2013 Úrvalsdeild karla season but was released from his contract in November that year. In 7 regular season games, he averaged 11.1 points and 5 rebounds.
Thomas joined
Þór Akureyri
Íþróttafélagið Þór, commonly known as Þór Akureyri, simply Þór or Thór, is a multi-sport club in Akureyri, Iceland. It features departments in Basketball, football, Handball and Taekwondo. Its main rivals is another sport club from A ...
in 2015 and helped them win the
1. deild karla in 2016 and gain promotion to Úrvalsdeild karla. He left the club in January 2017, after averaging 16.6 points, 7.1 rebounds and 3.1 in thirteen games, and joined
ÍR.
On March 25, 2018, Thomas scored the game winning and series clinching basket in game five of ÍR's first round playoffs series against
Stjarnan
Ungmennafélagið Stjarnan, commonly known as Stjarnan, is an Icelandic multi-sports club specialising in handball, football, basketball, volleyball and gymnastics located in Garðabær.and in the top 10 in the World and they have won the League ...
.
On May 8, 2018, Thomas signed with
Tindastóll. On 30 September, he won the
Icelandic Super Cup after Tindastóll beat KR, 103-72. During the regular season, Thomas averaged 13.2 points and 5.9 rebounds and played all 22 games. In the playoffs, he averaged 14.4 points and 7.4 rebounds but was unable to prevent the team from a heartbreaking loss against
Þór Þorlákshöfn
Ungmennafélagið Þór, commonly known as Þór Þorlákshöfn, is a multi-sport club in Þorlákshöfn, Iceland. It has active departments in athletics, badminton, basketball, motorcycle sports and track & field but has also featured various othe ...
in the first round of the playoffs.
In September 2019, Thomas signed with
Hamar
Hamar is a town in Hamar Municipality in Innlandet county, Norway. Hamar is the administrative centre of Hamar Municipality. It is located in the traditional region of Hedmarken. The town is located on the shores of Mjøsa, Norway's largest lake ...
where he had previously played during the 2013–2014 season. As he aspired to play for a bigger club, the contract included an escape clause that allowed him to leave the club with short notice. Two months later, in November, Thomas left Hamar and signed
ÍR. At the time of his departure, he was averaging 17.2 points and 6.0 rebounds for the unbeaten Hamar.
In June 2021, Thomas signed with newly promoted
Breiðablik. In April 2022, Thomas resigned with
Breiðablik.
National team career
Thomas received an Icelandic citizenship in July 2018.
On 23 August 2018, Thomas was selected to the 24-man training camp of the
Icelandic national basketball team prior to its upcoming games in the
EuroBasket 2021 qualification
The EuroBasket 2022 qualification was a basketball competition that was played from November 2017 to February 2021, to determine the 20 FIBA Europe nations who would join the automatically qualified co-hosts Czech Republic, Georgia, Italy, and G ...
. On 1 September 2018, he was selected to the team for its upcoming games against
Norway
Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the ...
. He played his first game for Iceland on 2 September, scoring 8 points in a 71-69 victory against Norway.
Personal life
Thomas is married to
Fanney Lind Thomas, an Icelandic former professional basketball player and a former member of
Icelandic national basketball team. After receiving his Icelandic citizenship in 2018,
he took up the Icelandic middle name ''Axel''.
References
External links
Icelandic statisticsa
kki.isProfilea
realgm.comMurray State Bioa
goracers.coma
sports-reference.com
{{DEFAULTSORT:Thomas, Danero
1986 births
Living people
American emigrants to Iceland
American expatriate basketball people in Iceland
American men's basketball players
Breiðablik men's basketball players
Forwards (basketball)
Hamar men's basketball players
Icelandic men's basketball players
ÍR men's basketball players
Murray State Racers men's basketball players
Ungmennafélagið Tindastóll men's basketball players
Danero Thomas
Valur men's basketball players