Italbasket, first day as Azzurro for Darius Thompson

Darius Thompson joined his teammates Thursday afternoon at the Azzurro gathering in Trieste. The guard born in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, but with Italian citizenship since 2020 will begin his training with the group as early as Friday.

After high school and college in the U.S., Thompson embarked on a long career in Europe starting in 2017 from the Netherlands with Leiden (a Dutch Cup). In 2019 he made his first contact with Italy in Brindisi, where he stayed for two seasons before moving to Kuban to play with Lokomotiv. In 2022 he is at Baskonia in Spain and for him comes the title of best assistman in the Euroleague (6.7 average) and the call of Efes Istanbul. As of this summer he is a Valencia player.

“I am very happy to be here,” Thompson said, “I watched some of the Azzurri’s games and saw a great group. I’m pumped up and can’t wait to start working with the team.”

In the meantime, the national team’s gathering for EuroBasket 2025 continues. On Saturday, August 9, the third of six summer friendlies against coach Luca Banchi’s Latvia at PalaTrieste. Two-way ball at 8 p.m. (tickets for the match are at this link).

The last friendly in Italy will instead be Aug. 14 in Bologna against Argentina (match tickets at this link). Both matches will be live on Sky Sport Basket (channel 209). This will be followed by the Acropolis Tournament against Latvia (Aug. 21, 7:15 p.m. Italian time) and Greece (Aug. 22, 7:15 p.m. Italian time).