| Danko Cvjetićanin | |
| Position: | Scout |
| Height M: | 1.98 |
| Weight Kg: | 90 |
| Team: | Brooklyn Nets |
| League: | NBA |
| Birth Date: | 16 October 1963 |
| Birth Place: | Zagreb, SR Croatia, SFR Yugoslavia |
| Nationality: | Croatian |
| Draft Year: | 1985 |
| Career Start: | 1980 |
| Career End: | 1997 |
| Career Position: | Shooting guard |
| Years1: | 1980–1985 |
| Team1: | Partizan |
| Years2: | 1985–1992 |
| Team2: | Cibona |
| Years3: | 1992–1994 |
| Team3: | Estudiantes |
| Years4: | 1994 |
| Team4: | Rijeka |
| Years5: | 1994–1995 |
| Team5: | Reggio Emilia |
| Years6: | 1996–1997 |
| Team6: | Zrinjevac |
| Highlights: |
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Danko Cvjetićanin (often credited as Cvjetičanin; born 16 October 1963) is a Croatian basketball scout and former player.
Cvjetićanin won two silver medals at the Olympic Games, one with Yugoslavia (1988) and the other with Croatia (1992). Cvjetićanin, who started his career with Partizan, won the European Club Championship with Cibona in 1986. He also played professionally in Spain and Italy.
Born in Zagreb, six-year-old Cvjetićanin moved to the Yugoslav capital Belgrade along with his parents and sister when his sociologist father Vladimir Cvjetićanin, whose areas of study primarily focused on the social structure of the Yugoslav population, took a management position at the state-owned Ivo Lola Ribar metallurgical factory in the Belgrade suburb of Železnik.[1] [2] [3]
Growing up during the 1970s in Belgrade, Cvjetićanin attended the Drinka Pavlović Primary School.[2] Being a tall yet mobile kid, he soon took up basketball in the OKK Beograd youth categories before transferring to KK Partizan's youth system where he was coached by Duško Vujošević.[2] While playing youth basketball in the late 1970s, teenage Cvjetićanin idolized two Yugoslav basketball stars with body type and skill set similar to his own—Dragan Kićanović and Mirza Delibašić.[2]
Cvjetićanin began his basketball career with KK Partizan.
In 1985, right before his 22nd birthday, Cvjetićanin transferred to KK Cibona, reigning European Champions Cup and Yugoslav League champions. The transfer was precipitated by his parents moving back to Zagreb.[1]
Arriving to Cibona as replacement at shooting guard for Aco Petrović who was away serving his mandatory Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) stint, Cvjetićanin made his club debut in November 1985 during week 5 of the league season versus lowly Sloga Kraljevo, scoring 36 points.[1] He then saw reduced playing time versus KK Zadar, leading to antagonism with Cibona head coach Željko Pavličević, a temporary conflict that saw Cvjetićanin not show up for the team's post-game meeting in protest.[1] Accepting criticism over his application on the defensive end, Cvjetićanin was soon reinstated.[1]
Cvjetićanin was part of the Yugoslavia junior national team that got silver at the 1982 FIBA European Junior Championship in Bulgaria.
Cvjetićanin made Yugoslavia's national team for the 1988 Olympics in Seoul led by head coach Dušan Ivković. Appearing in 8 games at the tournament, the shooting guard received significant minutes, contributing 9.8 points per game—thus being the team's fourth best scorer at the tournament behind Dražen Petrović, Vlade Divac, and Žarko Paspalj[4] —as Yugoslavia made the final where they lost to Soviet Union.
Playing in the backcourt with his Cibona club teammate Dražen Petrović or Partizan's Željko Obradović, Cvjetićanin's best scoring outing came at the preliminary group stage with 18 points versus the minnows of the group, South Korea.[5] He also had an important 16-point contribution (on 83.3% field goal percentage including 4 of 4 three-pointers) in the quarter-final versus Canada in only 17 minutes of action, taking advantage of Canada's defensive focus on Yugoslavia's star player and leading scorer, Petrović.[6]
After playing career, Cvjetićanin worked as the European scouting coordinator for the NBA's Philadelphia 76ers from 1998 to 2010.[7] [8] He has been performing the same position for the New Jersey Nets since 2010.
Cvjetićanin's son Filip (born 1993) played college basketball for the Florida Gulf Coast University.[9]
He is married to Marga Cvjetićanin, they have two children Lana Cvjetićanin born in 2014 and Tin Cvjetićanin born in 2016.