SAN FRANCISCO — A tearful Darko Rajakovic celebrated a Toronto Raptors’ win against Miami with a salute to the very first play: A scripted one his friend and fellow countryman Dejan Milojevic taught him.
It was a simple, but effective pass by Scottie Barnes at the top of the arc to Immanuel Quickley, who flared off a screen, took the open 3-pointer and nailed it. Milojevic’s superstar mentee, Nikola Jokic, runs the same kind of action in Denver.
It’s one of many threads to pull that unfurls Milojevic’s pioneering basketball career, cut too short after his sudden death at age 46 during a Warriors’ team dinner in Salt Lake City.
“The opening play of the game was an ATO that Deki, my friend, I learned that play from him,” Rajakovic told reporters. “That’s what he brought to the NBA. That’s what he brought to Golden State. I stole that play from him.”
Warriors fans may have known Milojevic as one of a dozen coaches who perched on the team benches during games, they may recognize him as the brutish-looking man with soft eyes and a disarming smile that never seemed to fade. Some will think of him as the man hired three years ago to mold the raw seven-footer James Wiseman and empower Kevon Looney to find ways to use his undersize stature as an advantage — just as he did.
In Warriors land, Milojevic is a 2022 NBA champion, a friend those close to him called “Deki,” and family whose sudden death was so shattering that the team will take a week and at least two games off to mourn.
In Serbia, his home, news of Milojevic’s death was seismic.
Milojevic was born in Belgrade and raised in the suburb of Padinjak. His basketball legacy began in the mid-1990s, when Milojevic’s ascent as a scrappy forward in the Second Basketball League and Adriatic Basketball Association coincided with the Yugoslav Wars. His reputation as an undersized power forward who dominated the post gave a downtrodden generation an idol on which to latch; Milojevic embodied the underdog grit and tenacity Serbians saw in themselves.
Coaches dubbed him not a “four” or “five,” but a “six” because he could outmuscle anyone at any position, Milos Jovanovic, a Serbian basketball journalist and documentarian, said.
“When you put him in he will out-rebound, out-hustle you,”Jovanovic said. “Watching him as a young player destroy people – and I mean that in a most positive sense – was a very rewarding experience because I never considered him to be an exceptional player talent-wise, but he made up for everything with hustle and earned every dime playing basketball the hard way.”
Even if not the most skilled, Milojevic was the most feared big man in basketball, or so Jovanovic learned covering basketball in Serbia for years.
“Young players (told me) the biggest adversity they faced in their playing career was practicing against Dejan,” Jovanovic said. “They’d say, ‘May god make sure we don’t have to play against him in a game because he will tear us apart.’”
With grit came reward. Milojevic won three ABA MVPs, two scoring titles and three YUBA League championships. But with precise footwork and a bruising game in the post, the man they called “Deki” earned a second nickname: “Serbian Charles Barkley.”
“Dejan was, in my opinion, the best European power forward from 2003 to 2008,” said Miroslav Cuk, a Serbian basketball podcaster who has been following Milojevic’s career since it began with Beovuk in 1998.
Knee issues ended his playing career around age 32, but so began a coaching career that would change Serbia’s presence in the basketball world. Miško Ražnatović, a European basketball league super agent, gave Milojevic the coaching job at Mega Basket in 2012.
Before Milojevic’s arrival, Milovan Raković was the only player from Mega to be drafted in the NBA. With Milojevic at the helm, 11 players were drafted in the NBA over his eight-year tenure. His first pupil drafted: Jokic, selected with the 41st pick to the Denver Nuggets in 2014. Jokic was one of few who could challenge Deki in practice, said Cuk, and Deki was instrumental in preparing Jokic for the NBA.
“Once he said that he had to prepare hard for every workout with Jokić because Nikola would do every new move perfectly on the first try,” Cuk said. “And he wanted to help him become unstoppable.”
Jokic has not spoken publicly about Milojevic’s passing as he is still processing the news, according to a Nuggets spokesperson. Nuggets head coach Mike Malone told reporters that Warriors coach Steve Kerr passed along a message from Milojevic.
“He wanted me to know how much Deki loved Nikola,” Malone said. “How proud he was of him. That’s what I tried to share with Nikola. I went through this with my father. Losing someone you care about is really hard. The most important thing for Nikola to know is that Deki did love him. And now it’s up to Nikola to carry on his legacy on the court, off the court. How he lived. And to make sure Deki’s name is continued to be talked about.”
Jokic has two MVPs, a 2023 NBA title and the reputation as a trail blazer who has paved a new path for Eastern Europeans into the NBA. But Milojevic opened the door with a coaching style that put brotherhood before plain old instruction. After Jokic, Oklahoma City point guard Vasilije Micić, Los Angeles Clippers center Ivica Zubac, Denver forward Vlatko Čančar and Indiana Pacers center Goga Bitadze are among the others Milojevic coached at Mega to play in the NBA.
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His legacy goes beyond Serbia. Dallas Mavericks guard Luka Doncic, from Slovenia, posted on social media a picture of Milojevic with three broken heart emojis and “Pocivaj u miru deki” — “Rest in peace Deki” in Croatian. Phoenix Suns center Jusuf Nurkic, from Bosnia, Spanish former player Pau Gasol and Utah Jazz forward Lauri Markkanen, from Finland, posted tributes of their own.
Former Warriors who played under him including Andre Iguodala and Suns’ guard Damion Lee posted, too.
“Saddened by the loss of my brother Dejan Milojevic,” Iguodala posted on X/Twitter. “Amazing HUMAN BEING! Sending condolences and prayers to his families. May he rest in peace.”
In Serbia, an informal petition is making the rounds to name the ABA MVP award in Milojevic’s honor. Serbian hoop-heads like Jovanovic think that’d only be fitting. But, more than anything, Milojevic’s fans in Serbia and beyond hope his legacy lives on. They saw Milojevic’s fingerprints all over Looney’s evolution in 2022 as a dominant rebounder key to the title run. They hope he will be remembered as one of the key men who put Serbia on the NBA map.
“For us Serbians, if you’re a hoops fan, we feel proud of his achievements because it means a lot when one of us goes to the (United States) to coach the Americans,” Jovanovic said. “It’s a big thing going over as a Serbian coach and making inroads. And the fact Steve Kerr spoke highly of him at every occasion and has a huge standing in the NBA meant a lot to me.”
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