Juan Carlos Navarro

Juan Carlos Navarro is a product of the FC Barcelona youth team. He started playing at CB Santfeliuenc before being signed up as a youth player by FC Barcelona.

After playing at different youth levels, he made it as far as the Under 18s in 1996-97. That was the season that it became particularly evident that the youngster had a potentially successful career as a professional basketball player ahead of him. A year later he started appearing in the occasional game with the B team in the EBA League, but also had a few opportunities with the first team. He made his ACB debut on 23 November 1997, when Joan Montes was manager.

The following season he mainly played in the EBA League with the reserves, but once again made inroads into the first team. Finally, in 1999-00, Juan Carlos Navarro became a permanent fixture in the first team, which was now managed by Aíto García Reneses. As the seasons went by, he became a more and more established member of the side, and despite being so young, came across as a natural leader.

When Svetislav Pesic took over on the Barça bench, Juan Carlos and the rest of the team produced some amazing basketball to win the Euroleague. But it was in 2003-04 that Juan Carlos made the biggest impact, and was by now a firm part of the Serbian manager's plans. He just once missed one game all season, against Polaris World Murcia in January, and that was because of flu. His statistics were a vast improvement on the season before in his best match he registered 30 points against Real Madrid on December 28.

Although he appeared in the 2001-02 NBA draft (picked in the second round by Washington), and despite the fact that his great pal Pau Gasol has triumphed on the other side of the Atlantic, Juan Carlos has always preferred to make a name for himself in Europe rather than going over to play in the biggest league in the world.

A full international for Spain, Juan Carlos Navarro made his debut on 18 August 2000 against Lithuania, scoring two points. He has gone on to become a regular fixture in the national side, taking part in the Athens'04 and Sydney '00 Olympics, the Sweden'03 and Turkey'01 Europeans, the World Junior Championship in Lisbon'99 and the European Championships the year before, Varna '98.

He is part of the so-called 'Golden Juniors' generation, along with other players that have also moved on to full international, such as Pau Gasol, Raúl López and Felipe Reyes, who managed to defeat the United States at the Lisbon World Junior Championship. He was named MVP of that tournament.

CHARACTERISTICS

Navarro is a talented attacker capable of thrilling the crowd with his amazing shooting skills. Thanks to his quick firing three-pointers and his powerful penetrating runs to slot the ball into the basket, he has earned him the nickname 'La Bomba' (the 'bomb'), a name that was originally coined by youth team manager Agustí Cuesta.

Juan Carlos Navarro's most impressive characteristic is his ability to know when, how, where and with whom he should be playing at any given time. This ambition, coupled with some tremendous skill and devilish speed, has made him one of the respected players on the continental hoops scene.

HONOURS

FC Barcelona
2006-07 Spanish Cup
2004-05 Catalan League
2004-05 ACB Supercup
2003-04 ACB League
2002-03 ACB League
2002-03 Euroleague
2002-03 Spanish Cup
2000-01 ACB League
2000-01 Spanish Cup
1998-99 ACB League
1998-99 Korac Cup

Spanish National Team
2006-07 Gold medal at World Cup in Japan
2003-04 Silver Medal at Euro Sweeden
2000-01 Bronze Medal at Euro Turkey
1998-99 Gold at junior World Championships
1997-98 Gold Medal at junior Euro Varda