Jaak Salumets (born 30 January 1949 in Paide) is a retired Estonian 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 ...

player and coach who played mostly at the forward position. Salumets is also a former

Estonian Reform Party The Estonian Reform Party ( et, Eesti Reformierakond) is a liberal political party in Estonia. The party has been led by Kaja Kallas since 2018. It is colloquially known as the "Squirrel Party" ( et, Oravapartei). It was founded in 1994 by Si ...

politician who was a member of the Riigikogu (Estonian parliament) from 2007 to 2011.

Early life and career

Jaak Salumets was born in Paide and started his basketball career in his hometown. Soon he was discovered by basketball coaches in TPI (present day TTÜ) and made his way through to the Soviet youth team and Tallinn Kalev. In 1968 he won the European Junior Championships with the national team, scoring 33 points in the final against Yugoslavia and deserved the attention of senior team coaches. Two years later he was invited to the senior team by Alexander Gomelsky, but then 19-year-old Jaak refused, explaining the decision as "I was too young and wanted to concentrate on studies". Gomelsky understood this as a personal insult and Salumets did not receive any opportunities to play under Gomelsky's led Soviet Union national basketball team anymore. In 1970, Estonian SSR managed to take a historical win over Team USA. Jaak Salumets scored 25 points against latter NBA star

Julius Erving Julius Winfield Erving II (born February 22, 1950), commonly known by the nickname Dr. J, is an American former professional basketball player. Erving helped legitimize the American Basketball Association (ABA), and he was the best-known player ...

. The Estonian considers this as his best game he ever played.

National team and Tallinna Kalev

Even though he did not have a chance to play under Alexander Gomelsky anymore, he made the breakthrough when

Vladimir Kondrashin Vladimir Petrovich Kondrashin (; 14 January 1929 in Leningrad, Soviet Union – 23 December 1999 in Saint Petersburg, Russia) was a Soviet and Russian professional basketball player and coach. He was inducted into the FIBA Hall of Fame in 2007. ...

was appointed as the head coach of the national team, the once rejected Estonian was given an opportunity. He was in the shortlist for the

1972 Within the context of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) it was the longest year ever, as two leap seconds were added during this 366-day year, an event which has not since been repeated. (If its start and end are defined using Solar time, me ...

Olympic team, but was replaced with Gennadi Volnov. Salumets finally won his first and last prize, bronze medal in EuroBasket 1973. After the only major tournament he got in conflict with the new head coach as well and was ruled out of the national team permanently.

Final years and coaching

Jaak Salumets did not win anything spectacular, besides playing in the top flight of the Soviet basketball. In 1979 Salumets concluded his career as a player and took a break from professional basketball. 6 years later, in 1985 he became the head coach of Tallinn Kalev, his former team, which struggled to show decent results in both

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

and Estonian SSR championships. With the new coach Kalev improved his game and won surprisingly the last Soviet basketball championships held, in 1991. The team consisted of players like Olympic champion Tiit Sokk, latter

Panathinaikos B.C. Panathinaikos B.C. ( el, ΚΑΕ Παναθηναϊκός), also known simply as Panathinaikos, is the professional basketball team of the major Athens-based multi- sport club Panathinaikos A.O. It is owned by the billionaire Giannakopoulos f ...

shooter Aivar Kuusmaa,

Gert Kullamäe Gert Kullamäe (born 3 June 1971) is an Estonian basketball coach and a former professional basketball player who currently coaches Estonian team BC Pärnu Sadam. Kullamäe mostly played at the shooting guard position and was a great 3-point sh ...

, and George Jackson, the first and also last American player in the Soviet Union basketball league. Shortly after the great triumph he was offered to become the mentor of Soviet Union national basketball team and

BC Avtodor Saratov BC Avtodor (russian: БК «Автодор» Саратов), commonly known as simply Avtodor and internationally as Avtodor Saratov, is a Russian professional basketball club based in Saratov. It plays in the FIBA Europe Cup and in the VTB Uni ...

. The years following

dissolution of the Soviet Union The dissolution of the Soviet Union, also negatively connoted as rus, Разва́л Сове́тского Сою́за, r=Razvál Sovétskogo Soyúza, ''Ruining of the Soviet Union''. was the process of internal disintegration within the Sov ...

Salumets moved abroad to coach Finnish BC NMKY Lahti, but he also became the coach of the

Estonia national basketball team Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, and to ...

, who reached 6th place at the EuroBasket 1993. After successful summer with the national team he was contracted by Lithuanian giant BC Žalgiris and achieved first place for newly recognized Lithuanian Basketball League. However, it was a one year spell with the 'Grunwald' and Salumets moved back to Estonia to his last stint with Kalev. He managed to contract the biggest prospect of Estonia,

Martin Müürsepp Martin Müürsepp (; born 26 September 1974) is an Estonian professional basketball coach and former player, who is the head coach of BC Rakvere Tarvas of the Estonian-Latvian Basketball League. Widely regarded as one of Estonia's greatest bas ...

, who had been in contract with European powerhouse Maccabi Tel Aviv, for the 1995-96 season. This is believed to be last big success for Jaak Salumets as a coach, as Kalev won the prestigious Haarlem Basketball Week tournament. In the way to the win, Estonian champions defeated Australia national basketball team in final-four, who reached the semi-final at the

1996 Summer Olympics The 1996 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXVI Olympiad, also known as Atlanta 1996 and commonly referred to as the Centennial Olympic Games) were an international multi-sport event held from July 19 to August 4, 1996, in Atlanta, ...

following year and PBC CSKA Moscow in the grand final.Kalevi 10 parimat eurovõitu
. ''Õhtuleht''. 12 November 2007. Accessed 1 April 2012. The same season

was drafted by Utah Jazz to the

NBA The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America. The league is composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada) and is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United St ...

and went on to represent teams such as Miami Heat (traded from Jazz),

Dallas Mavericks The Dallas Mavericks (often referred to as the Mavs) are an American professional basketball team based in Dallas. The Mavericks compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the Western Conference (NBA), Western Conferenc ...

and CSKA Moscow.

Achievements with club

Kalev Tallinn Kalev Tallinn is a multi-sport club in Tallinn, Estonia. The club was formed as Jalgpalliselts Meteor (Football Union Meteor) in 1909 and changed to its present name in 1911, when it joined the all-Estonian sports organisation Estonian Sports Ass ...

* Soviet Union League Champion: 1991 * Soviet Estonian Championship: 1968, 1971 * Estonian Championship: 1995, 1996 Žalgiris Kaunas * Lithuanian Championship: 1994

References

External links