Artūras Gudaitis (born 19 June 1993) is a Lithuanian 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 who last played for Panathinaikos of the

Greek Basket League The Greek Basket League (GBL), often also referred to as the Greek A1 Basketball League, or Greek Basketball Championship (originally called Panhellenic Basketball Championship), and also known as the Stoiximan Basket League for sponsorship reaso ...

and the EuroLeague. Standing at 2.08 m, he plays at the

center Center or centre may refer to: Mathematics *Center (geometry), the middle of an object * Center (algebra), used in various contexts ** Center (group theory) ** Center (ring theory) * Graph center, the set of all vertices of minimum eccentrici ...

position. He was selected by the

Philadelphia 76ers The Philadelphia 76ers, colloquially known as the Sixers, are an American professional basketball team based in the Philadelphia metropolitan area. The 76ers compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Ea ...

with the 47th overall pick in the 2015 NBA draft.

Early career

Before starting his professional career, Gudaitis played in the RKL with the LCC Klaipėda for one season. The next two seasons he played in

NKL The National Basketball League (NKL) (), also known as 7bet-NKL for sponsorship reasons, is the second-tier basketball minor league in Lithuania. It is placed below the top division Lietuvos krepšinio lyga Lietuvos krepšinio lyga (LKL) (''En ...

, and on his last season with Žalgiris-2 Kaunas he won a bronze medal. Gudaitis was respectively nominated as a most promising young player of the league on the same year.

Professional career

On 6 August 2013, Gudaitis signed a professional contract with Žalgiris Kaunas for two years and was brought into the main Žalgiris roster. Whilst suffering from the knee injury in the first half of the season he had his breakthrough game against Lokomotiv Kuban Krasnodar in the EuroLeague tournament, scoring 14 points with 6 rebounds. Gudaitis vastly improved during the regular season, and was called an x-factor of victorious LKL semi-final series against

Lietuvos rytas Vilnius 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 ...

. During

2014–15 LKL season The 2014–15 Lietuvos krepšinio lyga was the 22nd season of the top-tier level professional basketball league of Lithuania, the Lietuvos krepšinio lyga (LKL). The season started in October 2014, and finished in June 2015. Žalgiris won its ...

his powerful dunk over

Artūras Jomantas Artūras Jomantas (born May 4, 1985) is a Lithuanian professional basketball player who plays for BC Mažeikiai, Mažeikiai of the Lietuvos krepšinio lyga, Lithuanian Basketball League. Professional career Born in Mažeikiai, Lithuania, he mad ...

was selected as the Top Play of the Regular Season. On 2 July 2015, he signed a 2+1 contract with

. On 9 November 2016, Gudaitis scored a career-high 17 points and got 11 rebounds in a 101–84 win over Montakit Fuenlabrada in EuroCup Basketball game. One week later, on 16 November 2016, Gudaitis scored 12 points and got a career-high 15 rebounds. After a individually successful 2016–17 season, he was named to the LKL All-Tournament Team on 13 June 2017. On 12 September 2017, Gudaitis signed with

Olimpia Milano Pallacanestro Olimpia Milano, commonly known as Olimpia Milano or as EA7 Emporio Armani Milan after its title sponsor, is an LBA Italian professional basketball team, based in Milan, Italy. Its colors are white and red, and the team is sometimes ...

. On 25 February 2018, Gudaitis extended his contract that would keep him with the team until the end of the 2020–21 season. On 1 February 2019, during an away game against

Herbalife Gran Canaria Club Baloncesto Gran Canaria – Claret, S.A.D., is a professional basketball club based in Las Palmas, Spain. The team plays in the Liga ACB. Their home arena is the Gran Canaria Arena. From 2012 until 2021, they have been sponsored by Herbalif ...

, Gudaitis suffered an ACL injury that left him sidelined for the remainder of the 2018–2019 season. Despite having played only 21 games in the Euroleague during the season, he was one of its most efficient players, and was considered one of the league's top centers prior to the injury. On 10 July 2020 Gudaitis moved to Russian club Zenit of the

VTB United League VTB United League (russian: Единая Лига ВТБ) is an international professional men's club basketball league that was founded in 2008. It is made up of mostly Russian clubs, along with one each from Belarus and Kazakhstan. Since 2013, it ...

and the EuroLeague on a two-year deal. He left the team after the

2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, which began in 2014. The invasion has resulted in tens of thousands of deaths on both sides. It has caused Europe's largest refugee crisis since World War II. A ...

and spent the latter half of the 2021–2022 season with the Italian club

Napoli Basket Napoli Basket, known for sponsorship reasons as GeVi Napoli, is an Italian professional basketball team of the city of Naples. It's the ''de facto'' successor of the Basket Napoli which was dissolved in 2009. The team has achieved the promotion ...

. On 20 July 2022, Gudaitis signed a one-year deal with Greek powerhouse Panathinaikos, returning once more to the EuroLeague. In 29 EuroLeague games, he averaged 7.5 points and 3.7 rebounds, playing around 17 minutes per contest. Additionally, in 33 domestic league matches, he averaged 7.9 points and 4.8 rebounds, playing around 16 minutes per contest. On 3 July 2023, Gudaitis was officially released from the Greek powerhouse.

NBA

On 26 February 2015 Gudaitis announced that he was going to participate in the 2015 NBA draft and prior to the NBA draft, it was reported that 11 teams were interested in his services. On 25 June 2015, Gudaitis was selected in the second round, with the 47th pick by the

. On 10 July 2015, the

Sacramento Kings The Sacramento Kings are an American professional basketball team based in Sacramento, California. The Kings compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the Western Conference Pacific Division. The Kings are the oldest ...

acquired Gudaitis and

Luka Mitrović Luka Mitrović ( sr-cyrl, Лука Митровић; born 21 March 1993) is a Serbian professional basketball player for Crvena zvezda of the Adriatic League and the EuroLeague. Standing at , he mainly plays at the power forward position. Mitrov ...

from the

in exchange for Carl Landry, Jason Thompson, and

Nik Stauskas Nikolas Tomas Stauskas (born October 7, 1993) is a Canadian professional basketball player who last played for the Boston Celtics of the National Basketball Association (NBA). A shooting guard, Stauskas played two seasons of college basketball f ...

. It was reported that

Vlade Divac Vlade Divac ( sr-Cyrl, Владе Дивац, ; born February 3, 1968) is a Serbian professional basketball executive and former player who was most recently the vice president of basketball operations and general manager of the Sacramento Kings ...

himself requested to acquire Gudaitis. On 5 July 2016, it was announced that Gudaitis would represent the Kings during the 2016 NBA Summer League. On 8 February 2018, the

Cleveland Cavaliers The Cleveland Cavaliers (often referred to as the Cavs) are an American professional basketball team based in Cleveland. The Cavaliers compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Eastern Conference Central ...

acquired rights to Gudaitis after they completed a three-team trade with the

and

Utah Jazz The Utah Jazz are an American professional basketball team based in Salt Lake City. The Jazz compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Western Conference (NBA), Western Conference, Northwest Division (NBA), ...

National team career

Gudaitis represented Lithuania at the U–18 youth tournament in Poland, 2011. His team took 5th place in the tournament, where Gudaitis scored 11.3 points, grabbed 6.2 rebounds and had 1.4 blocks per game. In 2015 Gudaitis was included in the

Lithuania men's national basketball team The Lithuania men's national basketball team ( lt, Lietuvos nacionalinė vyrų krepšinio rinktinė) represents Lithuania in international basketball competitions. They are controlled by the Lithuanian Basketball Federation, the governing body f ...

head coach

Jonas Kazlauskas Jonas Kazlauskas (born 21 November 1954) is a Lithuanian professional basketball coach and former player. He was most recently the head coach of the Guangdong Southern Tigers in the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA). Playing career Kazlauskas ...

extended candidates list and was invited to the training camp. He was released from the team on 1 September, just 4 days before the championship start. He represented the primary Lithuania national team during the

EuroBasket 2017 EuroBasket 2017 was the 40th edition of the EuroBasket championship that was organized by FIBA Europe and held between 31 August and 17 September 2017. Beginning from 2017, the continental championships take place every four years with a similar ...

for the first time and averaged 4.8 points, 2.5 rebounds and 0.2 assists.

Career statistics

EuroLeague

, - , style="text-align:left;", 2013–14 , style="text-align:left;" rowspan="2", Žalgiris , 7 , , 1 , , 10.3 , , .600 , , .000 , , .636 , , 2.6 , , .6 , , .4 , , .7 , , 4.4 , , 6.9 , - , style="text-align:left;", 2014–15 , 20 , , 4 , , 15.4, , .506 , , .400 , , .618 , , 4.0 , , .3 , , .2 , , .9 , , 6.5 , , 7.2 , - , style="text-align:left;", 2017–18 , style="text-align:left;" rowspan="3", Olimpia , 29 , , 1 , , 20.4 , , .618 , , , , .715 , , 6.3 , , .2 , , .6 , , 1.1 , , 10.3 , , 15.4 , - , style="text-align:left;", 2018–19 , 21 , , 4 , , 23.4 , , .639 , , , , .805 , , 7.1 , , .4 , , .8 , , 1.0 , , 12.5 , , 18.7 , - , style="text-align:left;", 2019–20 , 19 , , 1 , , 16.5 , , .500 , , 1.000 , , .753 , , 4.4 , , .5 , , .4 , , .9 , , 7.3 , , 10.4 , - , style="text-align:left;",

2020–21 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

, style="text-align:left;", Zenit , 31 , , 24 , , 20.0 , , .601 , , .323 , , .381 , , 3.5 , , .8 , , 1.0 , , .0 , , 8.8 , , 7.8 , - class="sortbottom" , style="text-align:center;" colspan="2", Career , 77 , , 10 , , 19.2 , , .619 , , .0 , , .766 , , 4.0 , , .7 , , .4 , , 0.6 , , 9.7 , , 12.8

References

External links

Artūras Gudaitis
at draftexpress.com
Artūras Gudaitis
at eurobasket.com
Artūras Gudaitis
at euroleague.net {{DEFAULTSORT:Gudaitis, Arturas 1993 births Living people Basketball players from Klaipėda BC Rytas players BC Žalgiris players BC Žalgiris-2 players BC Zenit Saint Petersburg players Centers (basketball) Lega Basket Serie A players Lithuanian expatriate basketball people in Greece Lithuanian expatriate basketball people in Italy Lithuanian expatriate basketball people in Russia Lithuanian men's basketball players Olimpia Milano players Panathinaikos B.C. players Philadelphia 76ers draft picks Napoli Basket players