The Golden Juniors generation, with Pau Gasol at the helm, changed everything for Spanish basketball… at a time when everything was changing for Spanish sport. Without complexes and with champions in almost any modality, the basketball team was one of the mainstays of a golden age that accumulated successes and records. Pau has won eleven medals with Spain: seven in Europe, three in the Olympic Games (two silver and one bronze) and one World Gold, in Saitama. And his stamp is obvious as a reference to a team that stopped looking at others as giants and became the giant. Spain was the rival to beat, the Yugoslavia or the Soviet Union of previous decades in Europe. A fearsome team, which seemed to the rivals taller, stronger, tougher: better. These are the cities in which Pau Gasol has played unforgettable matches with Spain, some of them already in the history of our sport.
Lisbon (Portugal) – July 1999
Lisbon was the scene of the birth of the generation that forever changed the history of Spanish basketball. The Juniors of Gold trained by Carlos Sáinz de Aja obtained the gold medal in the World Cup of the category after defeating the almighty United States in the final (94-87). It was the first victory of a group of players that would hang twelve medals with the Absolute between 2001 and 2017 (the 2019 World Cup was the first championship without any of its members) and that would tear down impassable walls until then: the gold of Japan, the two Olympic silver after fighting face to face against the NBA, the victory against France in the Comanche territory of Lille …
It is the scene of the first Pau Gasol … although the oldest of the saga was not a starter. Life things. Things of youth. Germán Gabriel and Felipe Reyes were the pivots that Sáinz de Aja used from the start. But the Saint Boi man was there and played and revealed details of the great player he has become. His leadership and his commitment to the National Team began to forge in Portuguese lands. Our neighbors enjoyed for the first time the greatest star of national basketball, who 21 years later walks the last meters of his successful career.
Istanbul (Turkey) – September 2001
Istanbul saw the first great exhibition with the Pau Gasol Selection. The Catalan, only 21 years old and a few months after making his NBA debut with Memphis Grizzlies, made his debut in Turkey in a great championship with the Absolute. And his role was more than outstanding: 17.3 points and 9.7 rebounds for a PIR of 16.4. Its relevance was constant during important sections of the continental tournament until it became a giant in the last two games. In the semifinals he had the courage to score 22 goals against the great Serbia of Dejan Bodiroga, Predrag Stojakovic, Marko Jaric … and that he would finally hang the Eurobasket gold medal.
The fight for third place was even more legendary. Not only for his 31 points, but for his duel against another of the names that would become a fundamental part in the history of basketball: Dirk Nowitzki. It was the first head-to-head (of many) between these NBA stars. The German, considered the best European ever in the North American League, hammered with 43 goals, but was left without the award: the National Team, already from Pau and Navarro (27), would hang the bronze, the first medal of the generation of national basketball gold and the second consecutive in a continental championship. The change in the team became real in this tournament, with the first Golden Juniors (Gasol, Felipe Reyes, Navarro and Raúl Lopez) with stripes in the National Team. The story would totally change.
Stockholm (Sweden) – September 2003
Close. Pau Gasol was very close to his first gold in a Eurobasket. He had to settle for his first silver after falling in the final against the tremendous Lithuania of Arvydas Macijauskas, Sarunas Jasikevicius and Saulius Stombergas, among others. However, his performance in that clash was golden (36 points, 12 of 18 in shooting from the field, and 12 rebounds) as well as the tournament, in which he debuted as the top scorer with 25.8 points per game. Nothing bad.
Pau offered exhibition after exhibition. It was his second year in the NBA and his growth was more than palpable. He even dared to dismount Andrei Kirilenko’s Russia from the final with 31 points (12 of 14 at the launch) … only in the first half. Colossal. Power forward was no longer a project: it was established as a giant internationally.
Saitama (Japan) – September 2006
The East is fertile territory for the National Team. In the country of the Rising Sun, Spain made its place among the greatest. He raised his first world gold in 2006 (in 2019 he came second, in China) with a dream team, perfectly led by Pau Gasol until the final. He averaged 21.1 points (third highest scorer) and captured 9.4 rebounds (second), and was named MVP… without playing a minute in the final against Greece.
He was injured in the semifinal. TO 1:36 from the end he sprained his ankle when he stepped on Oberto in an epic duel against the Golden Generation of Argentina (Ginobili, Nocioni, Scola, Prigioni, Delifino …) that was resolved at the last gasp and after 19 points and 11 rebounds for a PIR of Pau 22. Another outstanding performance that could not be rounded off in the match for gold. However, his job was done: the FIBA Planet was his. His image with tears in his eyes and leaning on one leg to collect the medal traveled half the world.
London (Great Britain) – August 2012
There are games that mark a whole generation of players and fans. That elevate basketball beyond the sport itself. And the final of the London 2012 Olympic Games, played at the majestic O2 in the English capital, between the United States and Spain, is one of them. Four years after the incredible final in Beijing, both teams were looking into each other again, with the knife between their teeth. With a desire for revenge, the Spaniards, with the urgent need to reaffirm themselves as the only superpower, the Americans.
It was a brutal duel. Since the birth of Dream team in Barcelona 92, nobody had tried to twist the arm of an NBA with all its cast of stars. The result was a tight 107-100 that made dream of the impossible feat against LeBron James, Kobe Bryant and Kevin Durant. Pau Gasol was the hammer of the great occasions: 24 points, 8 rebounds and 7 assists. Only Durant scored more than him (30). His third quarter, with 15 points against the defenses of Chandler and Love, was the continuation of Navarro’s enormous exercise.
The defeat hurt the Spanish international, but his performance, his claw and his perseverance against the North American Leviathan made his figure grow to unimaginable heights. The entire American expedition comforted Gasol. Kobe Bryant melted into an eternal embrace with his brother. Gestures to honor the fallen champion. “We have had it close, we have almost touched it. They have had to try their best, but that does not help us. We came for the gold,” he said after the duel. “For the United States the gold, for Spain the applause“wrote La Gazzetta dello Sport.
Lille (France) – September 2015
The Stande Pierre-Mauroy, the chameleonic pavilion of the French city of Lille (225 kilometers from Paris), witnessed the greatest feat of Pau Gasol with the National Team. “Cruel”, L’Equipe titled the chronicle after his superhuman and tyrannical performance, within the reach of very few by the round (semifinals), by the rival (the host, Tony Parker’s France) and the environmental pressure created by the 27,000 blues fans who asked for Spanish blood. Like the previous year in Madrid, at the World Cup in Spain: the great disappointment of national basketball.
Gasol, 35, avoided any similarity to that disaster. The National Team reached this vital semifinal clash with its usual script: suffering and sweat to overcome the group stage. A little lamb near the slaughterhouse, which later turns into a giant. France did not intuit it and Pau martyred them. He signed 40 points in a duel that was decided in extra time, staying 8 from the highest score in the history of the national team, held by Jordi Villacampa. It was a 12 out of 19 from two and 16 out of 18 from staff. Not a triple. He grabbed 11 rebounds and finished with a PIR of 52.
He danced from the start to a young Rudy Gobert, who ended up out of the game for fouls. He scored the first basket of the clash and the last one in overtime. His image, hitting his chest after crushing the rival rim, became a symbol of his greatness. “I had a special motivation for last year’s defeat in our World Cup. It was a very tough defeat. Nothing to criticize France, they did their job and things happen. But I did want to come here to win a game like this one, to pass the bill for that.“Gasol said after qualifying for the final, that the National Team would beat Lithuania.
