A few days ago, hours before the fourth game between Real Madrid and Partizan in the Euroleague quarterfinals, Luka Doncic offered to pay for the funerals of the victims of the shooting at a Belgrade school, as well as psychological help for the survivors. . The Slovenian NBA star, born in Ljubljana 24 years ago, thus showed his solidarity with a land and a people that he also considers his. His father, Sasa, is Serbian, and part of the family is from Belgrade.
The gesture once again symbolized that strong union that the Dallas Mavericks basketball player feels with his roots despite a successful career first at Real Madrid and now in the United States. And it is not an isolated case. He often publicly shows his support for the Whites and remains highly committed to his team. “I have let my team and my whole country fall”, he punished himself after the defeat of Slovenia against Poland in the quarterfinals of the last Eurobasket.
To understand that strong feeling of belonging, you have to travel to the origins. To that Ljubljana where he grew up being the son of Sasa, a professional basketball player, and Mirjam, a dancer who at three months old already took him to the slopes to see his father. The boy who at five years old did not want to watch cartoons on television because he was only interested in the basket, who at eight was competing with much older kids, who burned stages at the speed of light.
In Wonderboy, The biography of Luka Doncic (Editorial Córner), Carlos Báidez traces a journey through the life and career of the star, from that Slovenia that found its pride in the beauty of its natural landscapes and in the brilliance of its athletes (Doncic, Goran Dragic, Tadej Pogacar, Primoz Roglic, Jon Oblak) to the competitive world of the NBA in which he has become an individual record hunter (despite missing out on recent title playoffs).
From his father he inherited his love for the orange ball. His mother instilled in him the discipline and coordination for dancing that today allows him to dance on the dance floor. As a child he also suffered the divorce of his marriage, a void that made him take refuge even more in basketball. Pablo Laso promoted him to the Real Madrid first team when he was still a junior, and he soon lived up to that nickname of Niño Maravilla. And there it continues, surprising. This summer, at the World Cup, he will once again defend his country. Another return to the origin of him.
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