''Not to be confused with Constantin Popa (military officer), a Romanian general who was awarded the Dutch Order of Orange-Nassau in 1975.'' Constantin Popa (; born February 18, 1971) is a Romanian-Israeli 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 (appro ...

coach and former player.

Biography

Popa played for

Dinamo Bucharest A dynamo is a magnetic device originally used as an electric generator. Dynamo or Dinamo may also refer to: Places * Dinamo (Moscow Metro), a station of the Moscow Metro, Moscow, Russia * Dinamo (Yekaterinburg Metro), a station of the Yekaterinb ...

in his native Romania before going overseas to play

college basketball College basketball is basketball that is played by teams of Student athlete, student-athletes at universities and colleges. In the Higher education in the United States, United States, colleges and universities are governed by collegiate athle ...

in the United States for the

University of Miami The University of Miami (UM, UMiami, Miami, U of M, and The U) is a private university, private research university in Coral Gables, Florida, United States. , the university enrolled 19,852 students in two colleges and ten schools across over ...

. The tallest person ever to play for the Hurricanes, he was twice a third team All-

Big East The Big East Conference (stylized as BIG EAST) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference that competes in National Collegiate Athletic Association, NCAA NCAA Division I, Division I in 10 men's sports and 12 women's sports. H ...

selection. In large part on the strength of a highly effective

hook shot In basketball, a hook shot is a play where the offensive player, usually turned perpendicular to the basket, gently throws the ball using a sweeping motion of the arm farther from the basket in an upward arc with a follow-through which ends over ...

, he was selected by the L.A. Clippers with the 53rd pick in the

1995 NBA draft The 1995 NBA draft took place on June 28, 1995, at SkyDome in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It marked the first NBA draft to be held outside the United States and was the first draft for the two Canadian expansion teams that were added for 1995–96 ...

. In the same year he was selected by the

Miami Tropics Miami is a coastal city in the U.S. state of Florida and the county seat of Miami-Dade County in South Florida. It is the core of the Miami metropolitan area, which, with a population of 6.14 million, is the second-largest metropolitan ...

of the

USBL The United States Basketball League (USBL) was a professional men's spring basketball league. The league was formed in 1985 and ceased operations in 2008. The USBL started in 1985 as one of the first basketball leagues to play a late-spring to ...

as a first round territorial selection (4th pick overall). He never ended up playing a game in either league, although he did play for the Florida Beachdogs of the American CBA, where he developed somewhat of a cult fan following. He also played in France with Pau-Orthez and with

Maccabi Tel Aviv Maccabi Tel Aviv () is one of the largest sports clubs in Israel, and a part of the Maccabi association. Many sports clubs and teams in Tel Aviv are in association with Maccabi and compete in a variety of sports, such as football, basketball, j ...

and

Hapoel Jerusalem Hapoel Jerusalem is a sport organization in Jerusalem as a local branch of the Hapoel movement. The branch was established in the 1920s and represents the city in more sports than any other sport organization in Jerusalem. Today, the club's lead ...

of Israel. Although not Jewish, he obtained

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

i citizenship as his wife is Jewish. Popa retired from professional basketball in 2001. He served 4 seasons as assistant coach of the University of Indianapolis Greyhound Women's basketball team, before becoming head coach in April 2011. Popa served five seasons as coach of the Greyhounds, compiling a record of 83–66. He was relieved of his duties in March 2016. In 2019, he was inducted into the University of Miami Sports Hall of Fame.

Awards and achievements

*Romanian Junior National Team – 87–90 *Romanian National Team – 87–92 *European Championships – 87 *

FIBA U18 European Championship The FIBA U18 EuroBasket is the new name for the FIBA U18 European Championship, originally known as the FIBA European Championship for Juniors. It is a men's youth basketball competition that was inaugurated with the 1964 edition. It was held bi ...

4th – 90 *Big East Conf. 3rd Team – 93, 95 *French ProA Champion – 96 *Israeli League Champion – 97, 98, 99, 00 *Israeli Cup Winner – 98, 99, 00 *Euroleague Finalist –

2000 2000 was designated as the International Year for the Culture of Peace and the World Mathematics, Mathematical Year. Popular culture holds the year 2000 as the first year of the 21st century and the 3rd millennium, because of a tende ...

*Israeli State Cup Finalist – 01 *Israeli League Finalist – 01

References

External links

Constantin Popa bio
at hurricanesports.com

at sports-reference.com 1971 births Living people Centers (basketball) Élan Béarnais players Florida Beachdogs players Hapoel Jerusalem B.C. players Indianapolis Greyhounds women's basketball coaches Israeli Basketball Premier League players Los Angeles Clippers draft picks Maccabi Tel Aviv B.C. players Miami Hurricanes men's basketball players Romanian expatriate basketball people in the United States Romanian expatriate basketball people in France Romanian expatriate basketball people in Israel Romanian men's basketball players Naturalized citizens of Israel Basketball players from Bucharest Israeli expatriate basketball people in the United States Expatriate basketball coaches Romanian basketball coaches Israeli basketball coaches {{Romania-basketball-bio-stub