Andres Sõber

Andres Sõber (born April 25, 1956) is a former Estonian professional basketball player and basketball coach. He is the current head coach and chairman of the BC Rakvere Tarvas.^[1] He started his senior club career with "Tallinn Kalev" team (BC Tallinna Kalev) in 1978 and after 1982–83 season he became a basketball coach.

Youth coach

Andres Sõber has been noted as one of the most successful youth coaches in Estonia. After retiring from professional basketball, he became to held basketball trainings for boys in Mustamäe district of Tallinn. With the team, which was frequently represented as Estonian SSR youth team, they won everything possible in their country, but also achieved valuable results over the Soviet Union. During the time, he was the first coach of the only Estonian to play in the NBA, Martin Müürsepp.

Finland and Estonia

After 8 years of working with youngsters, Andres Sõber spent 2 years making a living at the Tallinn Pedagogical Institute. He then moved to Finland, where he first served as a youth coach again, but soon became to conduct several Korisliiga teams. Eventually Sõber came back to Estonia, having been in Finland for 10 years, to coach TTÜ A. Le Coq. With the Tallinn University of Technology based team he did not achieve anything remarkable for two seasons and he moved to Estonian powerhouse Tallinna Kalev, with whom they became Estonian champions.

BC Rakvere Tarvas

In 2005 Tallinna Kalev and another minor Estonian team, KK Rakvere announced their bankruptcy and Andres Sõber was looking for new challenges. He considered coaching youth again, but then decided to establish new brand in Estonian basketball, BC Rakvere Tarvas. Despite financial problems and struggling to reach play-offs in the domestic league, they managed to get decent results and put bigger teams under pressure. The most important idea of the team was the symbiosis of the best local players, young players and some support from abroad.

The breakthrough season was 2009-10, when Andres Sõber managed to form a team, which consisted of experienced players, such as former Dutch champion Valmo Kriisa, NBA player Martin Müürsepp, young prospect Rain Veideman, member of the Canada men's national basketball team Richard Elias Anderson and basketballers ranked out of stronger squads (TÜ/Rock, BC Kalev/Cramo), Kristo Saage, Rain Raadik and Sven Kaldre for instance. They reached the finals, where they lost the series 4-2 to TÜ/Rock, despite leading 2-0 after two away games. The following year most of the team changed, as key players earned better contracts to bigger clubs.

National team

Andres Sõber played for Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic during his stint with Kalev Tallinn in 1976-83. He has been the head coach of Estonia U20 team since 2011, leading the team to win B Division and earn promotion to 2012.^[2] In 2012, head coach of the Estonia national basketball team, Tiit Sokk, included Andres Sõber to the national team to become the assistant coach for the EuroBasket 2013 qualifying round.^[3]

Personal

He is the father-in-law to former NFL football player Dave Ragone.^[4] Andres Sõber is also popular Soviet-Estonian singer Anne Veski's high-school classmate.^[5]

External links

• Profile at basket.ee
• Profile at bbl.net
• Profile at spordiinfo.ee

References