No 47 ANDRIS BLICAVS
6 feet 3 inch (191cm) Guard
1976 Olympic Games
The Australian Men’s basketball team was in Baton Rouge, Louisiana USA on the way to Puerto Rico for the 1974 World Basketball Championships. Ken Burbridge a player on the Australian Team and a great analyst of the game spoke to his room-mate about the team, the coach, the offense and the possible role his room-mate could play on that team. Burbridge expressed the opinion that his room-mate Andris Blicavs had the opportunity to make the starting five players on the team. Andris takes up the story. “I was twenty years old, in the Australian Team and overseas at the World Championships. I was just happy to be there and life couldn’t be better. Although I had been training hard, Ken’s analysis encouraged me to train with more purpose. Richard Duke, an automatic starter was carrying a bad ankle injury and Ken reasoned Lindsay Gaze could be considering options. It had the desired result and I ended up being a starter for the first game in the World Championships. Needless to say I was overcome by the emotion, played poorly and did not start in the next game. Fortuitously for me in that game Richard fouled out early in the second half, I got to play a lot of time and ended up scoring a few points. From then on I believed I could be a valuable contributor to the program.”
Andris “Andy” Blicavs was born July 30th in New Zealand.
He started playing basketball with the Adelaide Latvian Club ASK at age ten shortly after his family arrived from NZ. His father encouraged him to play basketball and coached Andy for most of his formative years. In the late sixties Andris was selected to his Club senior team at the age of 15. “Playing against men obviously accelerated my development,” admits Andris. He represented South Australia (SA) at Under 14 level in 1967 and at the Under 16 level in 1968 and 1969.
In 1971 at the age of seventeen Andris was selectedto the SA senior men’s team. He was a member of the SA Team for seven years (1971-77) and played on the SA teams that won the Australian Championships in 1972, 1973 and 1977. His string of representative years with SA was only broken when he moved to Victoria to play.
Coaches, who had a big influence on Andris’s development, were Alan Dawe, Ken Cole and ZiggyKauls. “Alan gave me the opportunity to play with SA and at the national level and improved my fundamentals......Ken Cole added to my individual skills and broadened my outlook by painting an exciting picture of the game at the international level. Ziggy was instrumental in developing my shooting style by pointing out flaws and demonstrating the correct technique,” recalls Andris. The SA players who influenced him during this period were the likes of Mike Dancis, Werner Linde, Glenn Marsland and Huba Nagy.
Andris recalls. “I was very impressed in those early days when I watched import players like Fred Guy (Melbourne Church) play or the touring American College teams who were always tall and had outstanding jump-shots........they were incredibly quick and great shooters. They dominated us, but each year we got closer to their abilities.”
In 1973 and 1974 Andris won the Noel Woollacott Best and Fairest Medal for South Australia. He also won the Milestone Medal (for the Under 21 player who polled the most votes in the Woollacott count) in 1971, 1972, 1973, and 1974.
In 1974 Andris was selected to his first Australian men’s squad and made the Australian Men’s Team for the World Championships in Puerto Rico. The experience of travelling to the USA and then to Puerto Rico for the World Championships gave him a taste of international basketball and demonstrated to him that he could play at the highest level internationally. Andris was an outstanding athlete and scorer. He was renowned for his smooth fundamentals, shooting and strong play as a shooting guard/small forward.
In 1974 Andrisplayed on the Australian Team in eight games against the Pac 8 All Stars from the US College system and toured with the team to the USA and China as part of the selection build-up for the 1976 Montreal Olympic Games.
Andris was selected to the Olympic team for 1976 Montreal Olympics. He recalls having to “beg” his employer (the SA Public Service) for six weeks leave to train and play at the Olympics.
The security at Montreal was very tight, as an after effect of the terrorism at the 1972 Munich Olympics. “It felt eerie and unwelcomingto board a bus armed with machine gun toting guards and being escorted everywhere. The accommodation was also tight….as the team of twelve people was squeezed into a two bedroom apartment at the Games Village.There were four in one bedroom, two in another bedroom,four in the lounge room, and two in the dining room.” He adds, “The excellent food was a constant challenge to one’s discipline. Those were days of no team doctors, physios, trainers, fitness coaches, dieticians accompanying the team, nor were there any guidelines as to what to and what not to eat. Several athletes in other sports had to compete in different weigh divisions because they did not manage their diets correctly.”
Andris was also suffering from “jumper’s knee” or tendinitis and was basically managing his own injuries as was nearly everyone else.
“The Opening Ceremony was great and the highlight of my sporting career,” says Andris. The highlight game at Munich for Andris was the 120-117 overtime Australian win over Mexico. Eddie Palubinskas scored 48 points and Andris shot nine baskets from nine attempts. Another game that stands out for him is the game against Italy. “They were a very physical team and yet we were level with them for 38 minutes and ten seconds, but they powered away to defeat us by seven. So close and yet so far,” he remembers. Australia finished eighth, the best to that time by an Australian Men’s Team in Olympic or World Championship competition.
After the Olympics in 1978 Andris was recruited by Victorian power club St Kilda to play in Melbourne in the Victorian Basketball Association (VBA). The VBA was the best competition in Australia at the time. Unfortunately for Andris his knee injuries continued and in 1979 he had knee surgery and missed the inaugural NBL season when St Kilda won the title.
Things did not improve for him as the next year 1980 he had his knee-cap removed and sat out for the year. He did manage to play a full season with St Kilda in 1981 the year in which the club was leading the NBL Championships at the end of the regular season but chose not to compete in the NBL finals in order to compete in the inaugural World Club Championships in Sao Paulo, Brazil. That same year he represented Victoria at the senior level. However at the completion of that season he had more surgery to realign his patella tendon and missed another year (1982).
He did play a few games in 1983. Andris concludes, “I came to realise that my injuries were too debilitating to allow me to compete at the highest level so I retired from elite basketball.” He was 28 years of age.
Andris maintained his involvement with basketball when he coached St Kilda in the NBL from 1984 to 1988. At the same time he was General Manager of St Kilda (which became West Side Melbourne, then Southern Melbourne) from 1984 to 1991. In 1992 he was appointed Operations Manager of the South East Melbourne Magic Club in the NBL. He then moved away from basketball into a number of executive management positions in Melbourne. He did continue to coach juniors at Sunbury for many years. He coached his son Kris and daughter Sara’s teams until 2008.
Andris Blicavs was one of the finest shooters ever in Australian men’s basketball. His athleticism and skills stamped him as one of the premier guards of his generation.
Andris Blicavs shooting his jump-shot (Courtesy of A. Blicavs)
Andris Blicavs (Courtesy of A. Blicavs)
(The Australian Basketballer Magazine)