FCBARCELONA.CAT

29.06.2007 19:12

De la Fuente: Farewell after a decade

Carles Cascante

The last game of the ACB League in the Palau Blaugrana against Real Madrid saw Winterthur FC Barcelona say farewell to the captain of the basketball section, Rodrigo De la Fuente, who is leaving the club after ten seasons.

Born on November 26, 1976, De la Fuente joined the Blaugrana at the start of the 1997/98 season from Washington State University in the United States. He started out at the Colegio San Agustín in Madrid and, before that, in the youth teams of Estudiantes, before deciding to make a career out of basketball and opting to cross the Atlantic. After two years at the Junior College in San Jacinto he moved to Washington State. Barça were, by now, following his progress and offered him the chance to play in the ACB League and De la Fuente jumped at the chance.

Debut day

The guard made his debut for Barça against Valladolid on Junuary 11, 1998. The Pabellón Polideportivo in Pisuerga was the venue as one of the best defensive players the ACB League has ever seen started his career. De la Fuente's first match under coach Joan Montes ended in a 78-66 defeat, but the Catalan coach knew the player's ability well and having watched him throughout his formative years in minibasket, and the junior teams. Despite losing, De la Fuente recorded nine points and four rebounds in his 34 minutes on the court that day.

De la Fuente became an integral part of a team that was undergoing a rebuilding programme. Montes began to reconstruct the squad and allowed several famous names to leave, such as Epi and Jiménez. It was later that year that De la Fuente became a permanent member of the first-team as he replaced Víctor Alemany.

Click here to see his ACB League statistics

Alongside Navarro

From the team that was playing when De la Fuente arrived, only Juan Carlos Navarro is still at the club. Not long before Navarro had begun to carve his own niche in the team under Montes as he made his debut in the 13th game of the campaign against Granada in the Palau. Now he is the only player to have experienced all the same highs and lows as De la Fuente after all these years.

The Barça squad from the game that saw De la Fuente make his debut in 1997/98 has seen five players retire; Quique Andreu, Jerrod Mustaf, Xavi Fernández, Roger Esteller and Sasha Djordjevic. The following year the team won the Copa Korac and reached the final of the ACB League.

Best memory

Winning the Euroleague in the Palau Sant Jordi has to be the outstanding memory from De la Fuente's decade with Barça. The atmosphere that was generated during those two days on Montjuïc was incredible and saw Barça win more than just a trophy. The team, then coached by Svetislav Pesic, was led by Dejan Bodiroga on the court. They beat CSKA Moscow in the semi finals and then defeated Benetton in the final.

De la Fuente was a crucial figure in the final on Sunday, May 11, 2003. The captain was in the starting line-up alongside Dueñas, Fucka, Bodiroga and Jasikevicius and he went on to score 11 points and achieve eight rebounds in the 29 minutes that he was on the court.

Click here for all the statistics from that final.