Krešimir Ćosić

Krešimir Ćosić was a Croatian basketball pioneer who became the first foreign player to earn NCAA All-America honors and the third international player inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.

Krešimir Ćosić became the first international player to earn NCAA All-America honours at Brigham Young University, won the Olympic gold medal with Yugoslavia in 1980, claimed two World Championship titles and three European titles across his playing career, and then served newly independent Croatia as a diplomat at the country's embassy in the United States — a life that moved through sport and history in ways basketball rarely produces.. After helping Yugoslavia win Olympic silver at the 1968 Mexico City Games, Ćosić enrolled at Brigham Young University in 1970, becoming the first international player to earn NCAA All-America honors and a hugely popular figure on campus, later converting to the Mormon faith. Ćosić returned to Europe after his college career and continued to star for Yugoslavia across four Olympic Games (1968, 1972, 1976, 1980), four World Championships, and eight European Championships, helping the country win two World titles (1970, 1974) and three European titles (1973, 1975, 1977). At 6'11" with genuine perimeter skill unusual for a center of his era, he was named EuroBasket MVP twice, in 1971 and 1975. Ćosić's crowning achievement came at the 1980 Moscow Olympics, where he helped Yugoslavia win gold, adding to the silver medals he had already won in 1968 and 1976. At club level he won five Yugoslav League titles with Zadar and Cibona, and later moved into coaching both clubs. Following Croatian independence, Ćosić served as a Croatian diplomat at the country's embassy in the United States. He was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 1996, becoming the third international player so honoured, and died from non-Hodgkin lymphoma in 1995, shortly before his induction.

Versatile, skilled center equally effective near the basket and on the perimeter

A pioneering figure who opened the door for international players to compete in American college basketball, and one of Croatia's greatest-ever players

• Olympic gold medal (1980)
• 2x Olympic silver medal (1968, 1976)
• 2x World Championship gold (1970, 1974)
• 3x European Championship gold (1973, 1975, 1977)
• Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame (1996)
• FIBA's 50 Greatest Players (1991)