Friday 15 April 2022

The first Lithuanian to make an Australian basketball team

 Vytautas Ĺ utas was born on 5 April 1925 in Dusetos.  He grew to over six foot, giving him an advantage in basketball, a sport he excelled in.  He began his basketball career in Lithuania.  At the end of WWII, with his parents and brother the family left for Germany. While in Displaced Persons Camps, he began to study medicine.  His free time was spent in the English zone playing with the Lithuanian basketball team. 

The family all came to Australia, there  first stop was the Bathurst migrant camp.  Here Vytas organised a basketball team. He later moved to Lithgow to work as a railway worker.  Shortly after he came to Lithgow Vytas, a keen sportsman, was camped at Wallerawang, where he was interviewed by the "Mercury."  During the interview he expressed the desire to lead a Balt basketball team, in social and competition matches against Lithgow teams and a "Mercury" representative immediately arranged for his introduction.  He began to train seriously a Lithuanian team called Sakalas (Signals).  He became Captain of the Lithgow basketball team in 1949 which contained three Balt migrants, himself, A Ramansauskas and V Ozols.

Later after moving to Sydney, he joined the Moore Park Club.  Vytas was chosen for the NSW team where he played as a forward. He later made the Australian combined team, where he elected as Captain.   He was the first Lithuanian to make the Australian basketball team.  He was known as a clever forward that rarely missed a goal. 

He was one of the original members of the Sydney Lithuanian sports club, Kovas. He is remembered as a great organizer.  He was a Kovas Club committee member for many years, captain of the basketball team and ALFAS (Australian Lithuanian Sports Federation) committee member.

 He is buried with his brother who passed away four years before his passing after suffering a heart attack in 1977.  They are interned in the Rookwood cemetery, Sydney.

References

Mercury (NSW : 1898 - 1954) View title info Thu 28 Jul 1949  Page 3


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