The club also announced parting ways with Pablo Laso
Baskonia appoints Paolo Galbiati as new coach
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Baskonia Vitoria-Gastiez announced Friday afternoon that it has signed Paolo Galbiati as the new head coach for the next two seasons, as the team also officially parted ways with Pablo Laso. For the Italian technician, this will be the first head coaching gig in the EuroLeague, and also first outside of his native country.
Galbiati, 41, arrives from BKT EuroCup side Dolomiti Energia Trento, which he led the past two seasons. Trento had a 13-23 record in the EuroCup over that span, while Galbiati guided the team to a fourth-place regular-season finish in the Italian League last season.
He is now set to make his EuroLeague debut with Baskonia, replacing Coach Laso who led his hometown team to a 14-20 record in the EuroLeague last season and a playoff appearance in the Spanish League.
Galbiati had a brief career as a player, and in 2007 he already started coaching youth teams, and he worked his way up until he won the U17 league title with Olimpia Milan in 2013. In 2016 he made his debut in the Italian League as an assistant coach to Luca Banchi first and Carlo Recalcati later in Turin. A couple of years later, in 2018, Galbiati led Turin to the Italian Cup trophy. He stayed in Turin the following season to assist Larry Brown and later to take the lead once more, and after that he joined Biella, where he could not finish the 2019-20 season due to COVID.
He went on to spending two seasons as head coach of Cremona in the Italian League, then a year as an assistant coach at Varese. In 2021 and 2022, Galbiati was also part of the technical staff at the Italian national team, with which took part in the Tokyo Olympics. He also led U20 Italian national team at the 2024 European Championship.