{"id":451973,"date":"2025-07-18T11:04:38","date_gmt":"2025-07-18T09:04:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/?p=451973"},"modified":"2025-07-18T11:04:38","modified_gmt":"2025-07-18T09:04:38","slug":"azuolas-tubelis-joins-zalgiris-to-replace-smailagic-a-childhood-dream","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/azuolas-tubelis-joins-zalgiris-to-replace-smailagic-a-childhood-dream\/","title":{"rendered":"\u0104\u017euolas Tubelis joins \u017dalgiris to replace Smailagi\u0107: \u201cA childhood dream\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p data-start=\"1428\" data-end=\"1597\">With <strong data-start=\"1448\" data-end=\"1466\">Alen Smailagi\u0107<\/strong> leaving for another EuroLeague team, <strong data-start=\"1504\" data-end=\"1516\">\u017dalgiris<\/strong> quickly moved to sign <strong data-start=\"1539\" data-end=\"1558\">\u0104\u017euolas Tubelis<\/strong>, one of Lithuania\u2019s top young big men.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"1599\" data-end=\"1782\">Tubelis, 23, signed a <strong data-start=\"1621\" data-end=\"1653\">two-year deal with an option<\/strong>, stating: \u201cPlaying in EuroLeague has always been my dream. I\u2019m ready to embrace this new challenge and earn my place in Kaunas\u201d.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"1784\" data-end=\"1964\">Sporting director <strong data-start=\"1802\" data-end=\"1824\">Gediminas Navickas<\/strong> called Tubelis \u201chungry and eager to grow\u201d. After three NCAA seasons and a dominant year in Vilnius, he now joins \u017dalgiris at full maturity.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Zalgiris\u2019 latest addition to the frontcourt is one of the most talented Lithuanian players of his generation &#8211; Azuolas Tubelis, who has signed a 2+1 deal with the club. \ud83d\udcf7 <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/arrndIwhF4\">pic.twitter.com\/arrndIwhF4<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 BC Zalgiris Kaunas (@bczalgiris) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/bczalgiris\/status\/1946132433096638724?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">July 18, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u017dalgiris Kaunas signs \u0104\u017euolas Tubelis on a 2+1 deal after Smailagi\u0107\u2019s EuroLeague exit. The LKL MVP is ready for the next step<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":146,"featured_media":451972,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_spbk_hide_featured":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[199,271],"tags":[],"rumors":[],"typology":[20],"posizionamento":[],"class_list":["post-451973","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-euroleague","category-lithuania","typology-ufficiale"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/07\/GwIIinOXAAAThDk.jpg","digistream_id":0,"digistream":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451973","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/146"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=451973"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451973\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/451972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=451973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=451973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=451973"},{"taxonomy":"rumors","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rumors?post=451973"},{"taxonomy":"typology","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/typology?post=451973"},{"taxonomy":"posizionamento","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportando.basketball\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posizionamento?post=451973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}