Thirty-eight years have passed since that amazing day of June 14, 1987, when the Greek National Basketball Team defeated the USSR 103-101 in overtime, clinching the EuroBasket title at the Peace and Friendship Stadium in Athens.
The score, sealed by two free throws from Argyris Kamvouris with just four seconds left on the game clock, gave Greece its first gold medal in a major tournament.
During the final, Greek basketball legend Nikos Galis scored 40 points, concluding the tournament as its leading scorer and Most Valuable Player, racking up 296 points in eight games. Greek team captain Panagiotis Giannakis also added 10 points and steered the offense, while starting center Panagiotis Fasoulas contributed 12 points in the paint.
Greece, which had lost 69-66 to the Soviets in the group phase just days earlier on June 6, refused to give up. The national team opened the Eurobasket tournament by defeating Romania 109-77 and Yugoslavia 84-78, stumbled against Spain losing 106-89 and then again its first game with the USSR, but then managed to secure an 82-69 win over France. In the quarter-final Greece summarily dispatched Italy 90-78 and, two nights later, erased a ten-point halftime deficit to beat Yugoslavia 81-77 in the semi-final.
The Eurobasket final saw twelve lead changes and five ties. Galis’s driving lay-up with 31 seconds left forced overtime at 89-all, after which the teams traded baskets until Kamvouris earned a foul with four seconds to go in the game.
Without the slightest hesitation at the freethrow line, Kamvouris sank both his shots. The Soviet players quickly advanced the ball back to their side of the court, launching a three pointer, but the ball hit the backboard and bounced harmlessly away.
Celebrations erupted instantly both inside the 17,000-seat arena and in city squares throughout Greece as millions took to the streets.
Sports historians have credited the victory with repositioning basketball in Greece from a niche urban sport to a unifying national sport, with basketball courts popping up all over Greece.
The echoes of that June evening still shape Greek athletics and identity even today; every 14 June the footage of Kamvouris’s free throws is replayed on state television, to the sounds of Europe’s “The Final Countdown,” the game’s now infamous theme song.
This achievement, just like Greece’s 2004 European Cup soccer championship, continues to inspire successive generations that the improbable can be rendered attainable through disciplined execution, a shared purpose and a dose of good old Greek determination.
See the final on the Nikos Gallis Archive on YouTube here.
