Jasikevičius was born into a family of athletes. His mother Rita, a famous Lithuanian handball player, won a silver medal with the Soviet Union women's national handball team during the 1975 World Women's Handball Championship. Following the success in the world championship, Rita was preparing for the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal. According to Rita: "Everything was calculated, planned: Olympic Games, then - the increase of family, one year break and then back to sports again. But everything happened differently" and she had to choose between her son and the Olympic Games. She decided to give birth to a child and give up the Olympic dream. Later on, the Soviet squad went on to win the Olympic gold medals in the Montreal Olympics and the national team's head coach shut the door for Rita Jasikevičienė to return into the national team in the future. However, Šarūnas's mother never regretted her decision.[5] Šarūnas remembers that his mother constantly said: "My son will give me back the Olympics".[6]
"One day, for example, (my dad) told me that up until a short time ago Lithuania had been an independent country - you could have blown me down with a feather. We weren't allowed to study these things, let alone talk about them. People were afraid to talk; almost everyone was a member of the Communist Party. If you didn't join you were putting yourself in a bad situation, you risked never finding a job and you would be cut off from social life, at all levels. What could we possibly know of what was happening outside that context? We knew nothing, except that the Americans were the bad ones. We could not see their movies, except clandestinely, and only thanks to the advent of VCRs. (...) Nothing from Spain or Italy or anywhere else."
— Šarūnas Jasikevičius, describing his childhood.[7]
In his childhood Šarūnas was a very agile child. His mother remembers that soon after learning to walk, Šarūnas immediately began to run leaning at 45 degrees. Rita: "He was running and running everywhere and I had to constantly chase him". The biggest penalty for Šarūnas was to sit. His younger brother Vytenis was slightly different though. He was slower, but both brothers were unable to live without a ball as kids.[5]
Jasikevičius's father Linas always was a sports lover and his son followed his lead to cheer for practically anything. Together they cheered for the USSR national teams or any athlete who had USSR written across his or her chest.[8] Not surprisingly, his dad took him to his first basketball workout when he was 6 years old. His first coach was Feliksas Mitkevičius in Kaunas basketball school, who was strict and never chased Šarūnas when he tried to run away from workouts.[9] According to Mitkevičius, when Šarūnas was 12 years old, he was so sick of basketball that he wished to drop it. He visited his parents, outlined the situation and stated that it would be a huge loss to Lithuania. Following it, his dad had some strong words for Šarūnas and forbade him to drop basketball, which he wished to replace with tennis.[5] In Kaunas basketball school he met with future NBA star Žydrūnas Ilgauskas with whom he was meeting practically every day, at school, in the gym or elsewhere for the next eleven years. Tomas Masiulis was another notable player on his team. Jasikevičius remembers that at first he was seen as the guy who was "talented but lazy" as he was not a committed athlete; all he did was joke around and try to work as little as possible. Consequently, on one occasions, his dad stopped him from going on a trip to Minsk with the team, a trip of the sort that only happens once a year, as his marks were disastrous and it was a punishment: "No school? So no basketball". However, his parents were happy to see him pouring his hyperactivity into basketball, and this made them urge him on towards the sport, as it also helped him avoid bad company. They played in the gym, and also in the street using scrap metal instead of real baskets, and their favorite pastime was called minus, a kind of forerunner of the game that can be seen today during the NBA All-Star Game called "horse". It was far from ideal, but his parents preferred to see him play with the scrap metal hoops in front of their home than down at the pitch, where it would have taken him less than five minutes to pick a fight with the wrong person. His childhood dream was to become a Žalgiris player, a team of which he was such a fan that he knew everything about every player, even the players' shoe sizes. Following the Žalgiris' victory in 1986 Intercontinental Cup, he begged his father to take him to the airport to welcome home the players, where hundreds of people were waiting in the freezing cold. His father knew some of the players, and managed to get signed posters and photos that he used to decorate all the walls of his room.[10]
"I was thirteen years old when I went to Spain for the first time. Flying to Madrid was like going to the moon, and it was also the first time I ventured into some kind of international competition. We went with ten players, the bare minimum. The reason is easy to understand; there was little money. But everyone wanted to take part in the expedition. (...) My father got us the sport uniforms, featuring the acronym K.S.M., Kaunas Sporto Mokykla or Sports School of Kaunas. So how could they refuse to take with them the son of the guy who had given them their official uniforms officers? Obviously, they didn't refuse."
Šarūnas Jasikevičius, about his first trip to Spain.[11]
Šarūnas started going to school at Jonas Jablonskis Middle School in 1982 and attended it until 1987. He had to take the bus to go to school even though the thermometer outside read minus twenty and he knew that the most important thing for his parents was that he spent as little time as possible with the bad kids on Partizanai Street.[6] From 1987 to 1993, he studied at Kaunas 4th Middle School.[5] On his first class trip, he went to Moscow, which he visited before the tournament. Jasikevičius's greatest youth memory in the city was the opening of the first McDonald's in Russia. He remembers that his classmates were listening with their mouths gaped open when he was telling them about the French fries, bread rolls with minced beef and fizzy drinks.[8] One of his childhood passions was history, especially about the Native Americans, as well as books about basketball as he was capable of reading a book of more than four hundred pages on basketball in two days. He was also curious about politics, especially when Perestroika began, because of which he was able to travel to Berlin with his father and brother, and was amazed by the visit to the Checkpoint Charlie Museum. His childhood favorite Lithuanian player was Arvydas Sabonis, whom he admired more than any other Lithuanian superstars, like Rimas Kurtinaitis and Valdemaras Chomičius, because of Sabonis' elite passing. However, his idol was Dražen Petrović, and he wished to be as good as him, watching his matches again and again, dozens of times, for hours and hours, and later started imitating him in workouts. After one of his trips, his dad came back with a videocassette recorder, using which he was able to record an NBA All-Star Game with Michael Jordan, Clyde Drexler, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, and David Robinson, and was later to watch it for a couple of years, more than a hundred times. Jasikevičius also started to record games of Žalgiris and Petrović every time he was able to. Thanks to the video recorder, he discovered the existence of the no-look pass of Magic Johnson. For him, he was the NBA, not Michael Jordan. His unselfishness, imagination, the way he dribbled, and how he passed between his opponent's legs bewitched Jasikevičius. Consequently, his favorite element of basketball quickly became assisting his teammates, which he tried to do like Petrović or Johnson.[12]
Later he continued his studies in the United States.[13] In 1993–94 he attended Solanco High School in Quarryville, Pennsylvania.[14] That year his team won 25 of 27 games and was one of the contenders for the State Championship final, however they lost their first playoff game and finished the season early. However, he was noticed by Billy Hahn, who was working as University of Maryland assistant coach and who invited Jasikevičius to join them.[5]
College career
Jasikevičius played NCAA Division Icollege basketball at the University of Maryland, with the Maryland Terrapins. He played as a wing, although he remade himself into a point guard in his pro career.[15] He did not see much playing time in his first two years in college, with seniors Duane Simpkins, Johnny Rhodes, and Exree Hipp ahead of him at the wing positions. As a junior, he became a better passer and improved his defense.[16] He averaged a shade under 13 points and 4 assists in his junior and senior years.
Jasikevičius made his pro debut in the 1998–99 season, with the Lithuanian club Lietuvos rytas, of Vilnius. With Rytas, he averaged 18.0 points and 5.4 assists per game.[17] In the following 1999–2000 season, Jasikevičius joined the Slovenian club Union Olimpija. With Union Olimpija, he won the Slovenian Cup. With Union Olimpija, he averaged 9.3 points and 3.4 assists per game.
Barcelona Bàsquet
Jasikevičius played the next three seasons with FC Barcelona, and won the EuroLeague with them in 2003. He started for the championship team, and averaged 13.4 points and 3.2 assists per game. He also led the team to two Spanish League titles, and two Spanish King's Cups.
Jasikevičius signed with the Indiana Pacers in July 2005. The deal was worth $12 million over three years. He played in the NBA with the Pacers in 112 regular season games (16 starts), over one and a half seasons, averaging 7.3 points and 3.0 assists per game.
On 25 September 2007, Jasikevičius signed with Panathinaikos. The deal reportedly was worth €7 million euros net income over two years (7.7 million including his buyout).[20] With Panathinaikos, he won the EuroLeague again in 2009.[21] Jasikevičius became the only player in basketball history to win the EuroLeague with three different teams.[22] He also won three Greek League titles and three Greek Cups with Panathinaikos. In 2009, he signed a contract extension worth € 3.5 million euros net income with Panathinaikos.[23] He underwent a knee surgery that same year, and after 5 months of rehabilitation, he returned to the court with limited playing time.
Despite rumors that Jasikevičius would join Žalgiris,[28] in July 2012, Jasikevičius signed with his former team, FC Barcelona.[29] During the fifth Spanish Liga ACB finals game against Real Madrid, Jasikevičius scored 23 points, and dished out 2 assists, in 19 minutes of game action. However, it wasn't enough, as Real won the game 79 to 71.[30]
On 1 July 2013, it was announced that Barcelona had parted ways with Jasikevičius.[31]
Žalgiris
In September 2013, Jasikevičius returned home to Kaunas, signing with Žalgiris.[32] On 30 September 2013, he debuted with Žalgiris, during a game against Unics Kazan, scoring 6 points and dishing out 4 assists.[33] He retired after the season, and joined the Žalgiris coaching staff.[34]
National team career
Šarūnas Jasikevičius, during the bronze medalists meeting, in Vilnius.Šarunas Jasikevičius, during EuroBasket 2011
Jasikevičius also led Lithuania to the EuroBasket 2003 gold medal. He was named the tournament's MVP, after averaging 14.0 points and 8.2 assists per game.[37]
Jasikevičius also helped Lithuania win the bronze medal at the EuroBasket 2007. He averaged 10.4 points and 5.6 assists per game, and scored a tournament-high 18 points against Turkey, on 3 September 2007.[38]
On 29 July 2014, Jasikevičius announced his retirement from playing basketball, and was appointed to an assistant coach position with Žalgiris.[41] After the firing of head coach Gintaras Krapikas during the 2015–16 season, Jasikevičius became the team's interim head coach.[42] On 13 January 2016, it was announced that he was appointed their new head coach.[43]
During the 2017–18 EuroLeague season, Jasikevičius and his Žalgiris beat expectations by ending in sixth place in the regular season. On 26 April 2018, Žalgiris qualified for the 2018 EuroLeague Final Four by beating Olympiacos in game 4 to clinch a 3–1 series win.[49] It was achieved by having a second lowest budget in the whole league.[50] During the semi-final, Žalgiris played Fenerbahçe, unfortunately losing 76–67. Two days later they faced CSKA Moscow in the bronze medal game, winning that game 77–79 and finishing third for the season. On 20 June 2018, he was named best coach of the 2017–18 LKL season after coaching Žalgiris to yet another Lithuanian League title.[51] On 27 June, Jasikevičius signed one-season contract with Žalgiris.[52] He was named as a LKL Coach of the Year for the third straight time in 2019.[53]
According to Euroleague statistics, Jasikevičius team's defensive rating was 97,0 during the 2019/20 season. Jasikevičius team's offensive rating was 100,7. The tight offensive system by Jasikevičius led to only 15,6 turnovers per game in his last season.[54] Under Šarūnas Jasikevičius, Žalgiris was the third slowest team with 80 possessions per game. This can be explained by mentioning the depth of Jasikevičius playbook, which had more than 40 different plays prepared.[55]
On 2 July 2020, he signed a two-year contract with FC Barcelona.[56] During his first season as a head coach of FC Barcelona, the club won the 2020–21 EuroLeague Regular Season.[57] On 26 June 2023, in a surprising move, Jasikevičius parted ways with the Catalan powerhouse after three seasons, despite having won the 2023 Liga ACB championship a few days before.
On 14 December 2023, Jasikevičius was announced as Fenerbahçe head coach on a three-year deal.[58]
Note: The EuroLeague is not the only competition in which the team played during the season. He also coached in domestic competition, and regional competition if applicable.
In 2009, he met Anna Douka, in an Athens bar. Currently, the pair have two children: a girl named Aila, who was born in 2010,[61] and a boy named Lukas, who was born in 2012.[62]
In 2015, his biographical book Laimėti neužtenka (English: To win is not enough) was published in Italian, Greek and Lithuanian languages.[64] An English version was also soon released. Later on, Spanish and Israeli publishing houses also showed interest.[65]