Bowing down to the legends: Peter Vilfan

Peter Vilfan, one of the best Slovenian basketball players of all time, who we once had the opportunity to watch in the Dragons’ jersey, is celebrating his birthday today.

For many basketball connoisseurs, Peter Vilfan is remembered as a player before his time. The remarkable combination of a soft hand when shooting and incredible explosiveness was the main reason for the development of an exceptional shooter who instilled fear in the bones of anyone who stood against him. He proved this, among other things, in the jersey of Belgrade’s Partizan, as he set a record for the number of points scored in one season (1008) in just one season of playing in Belgrade, which is still valid today.

Vilfan left his mark on both the Yugoslav and Slovenian national teams. He played for Yugoslavia for the first time in 1977 and played 121 games, which places him only behind Vinko Jelovec and Ivo Daneu on the eternal list of Slovenian basketball players who wore the Yugoslav jersey. He won four medals – gold, silver and two bronze.

Vilfan certainly remembers the gold medal from the 1978 World Cup in Manila (Philippines), which he won together with many giants of European basketball: Dragan Dalipagić, Dragan Kičanović, Mirza Delibašič, Krešimir Ćosić,… Vilfan was also the first captain of the Slovenian men’s national team in the first official match in 1992 in Slovenske Konjice, and wore the Slovenian jersey in 11 games.

Vilfan, born in Maribor, made his first basketball steps in the Železničar team, and he was lured into his ranks after he first walked on the outdoor court II Grammar School in Maribor. The path did not immediately lead him to Ljubljana, but to Jugoplastika in Split. This was followed by a move to Ljubljana, Belgrade’s Partizan, etc., but Vilfan left the biggest mark on the Ljubljana floor, in the Olimpija jersey. He played for the Dragons in two periods, between 1979 and 1984 and 1987 and 1993. He achieved four major successes with the Ljubljana club, and in 1993 he finally put his sneakers in the corner.

Even though Vilfan hung his sneakers on a wedge in the early 1990s, he can still be seen in sports halls as a sports commentator. He usually watches Cedevita Olimpija games in the company of his grandchildren and daughter Anja and son-in-law Vlatko Ilievski, another former Dragon. Vilfan also founded his own basketball school, which is still active, and he also tried his hand at politics, but later withdrew from it. In 2013, Vilfan was admitted to the Temple of Slovenian Sports Heroes, and a year later he received the Bloudek Award for “Top International Sports Achievement”.

In 2008, he also became the vice-president of the then Union Olimpija for a while, and already in the 1995/96 competition season, Vilfan also tested himself as the head coach of the senior team of the then Smelt Olimpija.