Latvia Basketball Coaches Council was founded on the 17th of October 1934 as approved by the board of LBA.
At present, there are 221 active basketball coaches registered in the association.
Way back in history, the first task of the council is the preparation for the first European Championship in 1935. To fulfill this task, the council assigned Valdemars Baumanis to handle the national team.
The Latvian national team won the gold for the said championship. The following year, he coached the team in 2006 Olympics. In 1939, Baumanis coached the national team to second place in that year’s European Championsip Title. He was also the referee in the basketball games in Berlin and the first FIBA referee in Latvia. His achievements made him the best coach pre- war. Post- war, he coached Lorient CEP in France then finally moving to United States.
Adolfs Grasis is another coach that founded the School of Basketball Coaches. He coached the top Latvian club teams prior to World War II and later on, coached Latvian Men’s National Team in 1937. Grasis, a doctor of sports medicine, became a teacher in the Latvian Academy of Sport Education following the war. He wrote 11 books all about basketball.
Olgerts Altbergs is one of the talented coaches post-war. He was the founder of the Latvian women’s basketball. Altbergs became the Latvian champion in basketball in the years 1943, 1944, and 1950. He was also the founder of the great TTT in 1958. He coached the team to victory in the European Cup for club teams 3 years in a row (1960, 1961, and 1962).
Altbergs then presided over Latvian Basketball Coaches Council in 1971 until 1992.
He also taught young basketball coaches at Latvian Academy of Sport Education since 1951. Altberg then passed the torch to Raimonds Karnitis as the coach of TTT. He coached the team from 1962 to 87 wherein he became one of the most successful coaches in Latvia since the TTT team earned the European Cup for champion teams for 15 times and the USSR championship title for 18 times under his leadership.
Another coach named to be one of the best coaches before war is Alfreds Krauklis. He began coaching in 1940 supervising tops teams in Latvia including VEF, Dinamo, Daugava, Spartaks and Starts. Krauklis also coached the Latvia national team in 20 games.
Aleksandrs Gomelskis is one of the talented coaches during the post war period. He coached the Riga ASK team from 1954 to 1965. Riga ASK became the four-time USSR champion and three time European Cup for club teams in the years1958 to 60.
The coach with most experiences in the country so far is Armands Kraulins. He began as a young basketball player and a coach of women’s team. Kraulins had coached men’s teams such as University (Tashkent, 1981-84), VEF (Riga), ASK (Riga, 1988-90), and Dinamo (Moscow, 1985-88).
He then coached teams in Iraq and Columbia. Kraulins then returned to the country in 1992 to continue his coaching career. He coached the Latvian men’s national team from 1992 to 2003. The national team were qualified in the finals of the European Master Competitions for two years under his leadership in 1993 and 2003. In 2004, Kraulin was appointed by the LBA as the head coach of the women’s national team.
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