Lithuania. Basketball as Resistance against Oppression

“In Siberia we built a regulation basketball court. Basketball allowed us to have dignity, to retain our sense of humanity. How did I survive? Basketball. It gave me a lot. They didn’t bury me.” These are the words of Juozas Butrimas, a Siberian Gulag survivor from the 1950s. The whole sports club Zalgiris in Kaunas was falsely accused of participating in anti-Soviet, Lithuanian resistance organization and most of them were deported in the Siberian cold. In the wake of the Eurobasket final, Lithuania vs. France, let me just recommend once more the 2012 documentary “The Other Dream Team” where director Marius Markevicius documents ...