Sandis Valters (born 31 August 1978) is a retired professional basketball

shooting guard The shooting guard (SG), also known as the two, two guard or off guard,Shooting guards are 6'3"–6'7"BBC Sports academy URL last accessed 2006-09-09. is one of the five traditional positions in a regulation basketball game. A shooting guard's m ...

, who last played for

BK Ventspils BK Ventspils is a professional basketball club that is located in Ventspils, Latvia. The club competes in the Latvian-Estonian Basketball League. History BK Ventspils was founded in 1994. In first years Ventspils proved themselves as relevant pa ...

. He is member of

Latvia national basketball team The Latvia men's national basketball team ( lv, Latvijas basketbola izlase) represents Latvia in international basketball. They are organized and run by the Latvian Basketball Association. Latvia has reached the European Basketball Championshi ...

. His father is a former Soviet basketball star,

Valdis Valters Valdis Valters (born August 4, 1957) is a retired Latvian professional basketball player. He played at the point guard position for the senior USSR national team. He is regarded as one of the greatest players to have played the game in Europe in ...

, and his younger brother,

Kristaps Valters Kristaps Valters (born September 18, 1981) is a Latvian former professional basketball player. After retiring he became a coach, and is currently working as a head coach for Valmiera/ORDO. Playing career Valters first played professionally in ...

, also plays professional basketball.

Professional career

He first played professionally in 1994, for BK Brocēni, where he won his first five Latvian league titles. In 2001, after Brocēni disappeared, Valters moved to their successor

BK Skonto BK Skonto is the name of a former professional basketball club that was based in Riga, Latvia. History BK Skonto was founded in 2001 as a basketball section of FC Skonto. Basketball club was created by FC Skonto president Guntis Indriksons and ...

, where he spent two seasons. In 2003, Sandis signed with Germany's team

TBB Trier Gladiators Treves, for sponsorship reasons known as Römerstrom Gladiators Trier, is a professional basketball club based in Trier Trier ( , ; lb, Tréier ), formerly known in English as Trèves ( ;) and Triers (see also names in other langua ...

, where he had great season. Next season he also started in Germany, playing for team from Wuerzburg, but later in 2005 moved to Ukrainie, where he finished season with

BC Azovmash MBK Mariupol ( uk, МБК «Маріуполь»") (former name: BK Azovmash)is a Ukrainian professional basketball club. It was founded in 1990 in the city of Mariupol in South-Eastern Ukraine. Mariupol was one of the strongest teams in Ukraine ...

. For the 2005–06 season Valters had offers from Greece, Israel and Russia, but he opted to return to the Riga, where he signed lucrative contract with then up-and-coming team

ASK Rīga ASK Rīga is a former professional basketball club that was based in Riga, Latvia. "ASK" stood for "Armijas Sporta Klubs" (in English: Army Sports Club). History BK Rīga was then founded in 2004, and it got back the original name of ASK ...

. Valters also served as the captain of team. His best season with ASK was in 2006–07 as he led his squad to Latvian league title, while Valters was named finals most valuable player. During that season Valters was selected in every tournament's All-Star game ( LBL,

BBL A barrel is one of several units of volume applied in various contexts; there are dry barrels, fluid barrels (such as the U.K. beer barrel and U.S. beer barrel), oil barrels, and so forth. For historical reasons the volumes of some barrel units ...

and

FIBA EuroCup FIBA EuroChallenge (called the FIBA Europe League in 2003–05, and FIBA EuroCup in 2005–08) was the 3rd-tier level transnational men's professional continental club basketball competition in Europe, from 2003 to 2015. It was organized and run ...

) that his club participated in. In July 2008 Lithuanian powerhouse

BC Lietuvos Rytas Rytas Vilnius is a Lithuanian professional basketball club based in Vilnius, Lithuania. The club was founded in 1997 from another club, Statyba, and has become one of the most successful Lithuanian basketball clubs. Rytas have won two EuroCup Ba ...

wanted to sign Valters, but ASK did not let him go. In early 2009 Valters had to leave ASK as the club went through financial problems, so he signed for the remainder of the season with the Italian team from

Imola Imola (; rgn, Jômla or ) is a city and ''comune'' in the Metropolitan City of Bologna, located on the river Santerno, in the Emilia-Romagna region of northern Italy. The city is traditionally considered the western entrance to the historical re ...

. An injury during the Eurobasket 2009 preparation game with Latvian national team forced Valters to miss the first half of the 2009–10 season. In January 2010 he signed with VEF Rīga, where he played for next two and a half seasons, winning two Latvian league championships. In one of those finals Valters was named as most valuable player. On 19 September 2012, Valters signed a two-year contract with

. In his first season with Ventspils, he helped to win the

Baltic Basketball League Baltic Basketball League (BBL) was the Baltic states basketball league founded in 2004. The league mainly focused on teams from the Baltic states, but teams from Sweden, Russia, Kazakhstan, Finland, and Belarus have participated in the Baltic L ...

championship. At the end of the 2013–14 season, Valters won his 9th Latvian League championship.

International career

Valters was a regular member of the

and has played in two

EuroBasket EuroBasket, also commonly referred to as the European Basketball Championship, is the main international basketball competition that is contested quadrennially, by the senior men's national teams that are governed by FIBA Europe, which is the E ...

(

2005 File:2005 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico; the Funeral of Pope John Paul II is held in Vatican City; "Me at the zoo", the first video ever to be uploaded to YouTube; Eris was discovered in ...

and

2007 File:2007 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: Steve Jobs unveils Apple's first iPhone; TAM Airlines Flight 3054 overruns a runway and crashes into a gas station, killing almost 200 people; Former Pakistani Prime Minister of Pakistan, Pr ...

) tournaments. One of his best games with the national team was in 2005 against Spain, when he erupted for 28 points, hitting six three-pointers, including buzzer beating three-pointer at the end of regulation.fibaeurope.com
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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Valters, Sandis 1978 births Living people ASK Riga players BC Azovmash players BK VEF Rīga players BK Ventspils players Latvian men's basketball players Shooting guards Basketball players from Riga