So here is the second bout of the famous Basketball Players of New Zealand.
Mark Dickel
Dickel was born on the 21st of December, 1976 in Dunedin, New Zealand. He started his professional basketball player career in the year 1993 for the Otago Nuggets which is one of the competing teams of the NBL. He is the point guard of the team. During his first years in the Nuggets, his talents were seen and he was regarded as the Rookie of the year after the great season. He is currently playing for the A1 Ethniki Club Trikala 2000 BC in the country Greece.
He played for college basketball with UNLV in the 1996-1999 until such time that he was asked to play for the New Zealand NBL’s North Harbour Kings team in the year 2000. He was then acquired by the team Victoria Titans where he played for 2 years from 2000-2002 in the Australian NBL, he then pursued his career in Europe after.
As remembered in the history of New Zealand Basketball, Dickel led the TBL team with his very tactical Assists in the 2002 to 2003 seasons; he was then playing for the team Fenerbahce. Another breakthrough award was received by Dickel when he was chosen as the Eurobasket Most Valuable Player in that same year; the award was given in Turkey.
In the 2004 to 2005 seasons of the EuroBasket, he played for the Edermirspor where he averaged with 19.6 points and a total of nine assists. Because of this, he was then chosen to play in the All-Star Games in the 2006 FIBA Euro Cup.
In the year 2006 month of August, Mark Dickel faced a very serious problem as he turned positive in a cannabis drug test. He was then suspended by not playing for two matches against Qatar by the New Zealand basketball association.
On the other hand, FIBA also have imposed 10 day additional suspension which entailed Dickel not to join the first 3 matches of the FIBA World Championships. Finally, he was released by the Lokomotiv Rostov team because of this undesirable exposure, after which he then signed for the Polish Club titled Anwil Wloclawek for the 2006 to 2007 season.
After the controversy he again had encountered a back injury acquired when he was playing for Maroussi, a Club for Greek League in January 2007. He came back July 2007 and signed for the Brose Baskets of Bamberg which is the reigning German champions.
He is currently head coaching the Albanian National Men’s Basketball Team.
Kirk Samuel Penney
Born on 23rd of November, 1980 in North Shore, Auckland, Penney is a current professional basketball player with a height f 6 feet and 5 inches. He is an effective shooting.
His professional career as a basketball player started when he was offered by the NBA team Minnesota Timberwolves even though he was not drafted in the 2003 NBA Drafts. Penney finally got a very sour grapy 10 day contract for the Miami Heat on the 3rd of November, 2003. He was the second New Zealander to ever play in the NBA scene however, the contract was not extended instead it was only cut for only 3 days.
Penney again was offered to play for the Los Angeles Clippers which lasted only from December 26, 2004 to January 3, 2005. He had four games in total.
He later signed a contract for the European Powerhouse Maccabi Tel Aviv upon being a free player in the 204 and 2005 seasons.
He has a lot of individual achievements and some of these are: NZNBL Rookie of the Year (1998); NZNBL Outstanding Kiwi Guard (1999); ANBL MVP (2009).
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