Aco Petrović (basketball)


Aleksandar "Aco" Petrović was a Serbian basketball coach.

Career

Petrović started his coaching career in Radnički Belgrade, where he spent four years. After that, he was assistant coach of the Crvena zvezda and won the 1997–98 Yugoslavia championship. He also led the FMP Železnik and Hemofarm Vršac from domestic clubs.
The first foreign engagement was in Russia in the team Lokomotiv Rostov, and with them he came to the final of 2005 FIBA Europe Conference North. Also, Petrović has led more than foreign clubs UNICS, Žalgiris and Azovmash.

National team

Petrović was an assistant coach of Svetislav Pešić in the national team of Yugoslavia, with whom he won gold at the 2001 European Championships in Turkey and, a year later, at the World Championships in Indianapolis. He also has a silver medal from the 2009 European Championships in Poland when he was in the coaching staff of Dušan Ivković.

Illness and death

During his work at the club UNICS it was detected the disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, and Petović stopped coaching after that. Last UNICS game led by him was against his former club Crvena zvezda in the 2012–13 Eurocup. He died on 1 December 2014 at the age of 55.