Antti Nikkilä

Antti Tapio Nikkilä ( born August 25, 1978 in Tampere ) is a Finnish professional basketball player. After studying in the United States, where he was active in the NCAA Division I, he received a contract with Aris Thessaloniki in Greece, but where he could not prevail in 2003. Then Nikkilä played several more seasons in the second division of Italy and Spain. A commitment to the German Basketball League came into existence in 2010 not because the MBC from Weissenfels made ​​for medical reasons after an injury-related surgery for the resolution of the Treaty.

Nikkilä went public in 1999 at age 21 to study at the Valparaiso University in the same place in the U.S. state of Indiana, where he was active for the high school team in the NCAA Division I Crusaders. The Valpo Crusaders were during their membership in the Mid-Continent Conference until 2007 one of the leading teams of the NCAA Conference and failed to qualify during Nikkiläs active time twice for the national finals of the NCAA, where they were eliminated in the first round each. Nikkilä average was used in the Crusaders no more than 10 minutes per game.

Despite its rather mediocre stats in the NCAA Nikkilä got after the end of the study in 2003 a contract in the first Greek League A1 Ethniki at Aris Thessaloniki. Here he could not sit down and moved to the next season to league rivals Ionikos Neas Filadelfias, an Athens suburb club. This was in the 2004/05 season but in difficulties and also got off at the end of the season. Nikkilä changed in January 2005, the first French LNB Pro A League to BCM Gravelines Dunkerque on the North Sea coast. With the club he was the 2005 French Cup Coupe de France win and reach the final in the League Cup Semaine de ace. In the following season, he joined the Italian second division Legadue to Caserta. After a third place in the main round a promotion place was missed in the play- offs. After a season at the Czech series champion CEZ Nymburk from where he won the league and cup double in 2007, he was in the 2007/ 08 season back in the Legadue in Sardinian Sassari. After a third round main venue is not a promotion place in the play- offs more could be achieved with this club, while his former club from Caserta this time managed to carve out.

After a season in his parent club Tampere Pyrintö in the 2008 /09 season he was in the 2009/10 season in the Spanish second division LEB Oro in Girona under contract. With a ninth place after the main round of the last remaining play-off place was reached, in which there is no promotion place in the first division but was more accessible for the team. In 2010 he signed a contract with the Central German first BC in the first German league. After surgery, the elbow recovery step but not fast enough, so that the association dissolved the contract before the season starts. Nikkilä then returned back to his original club in Tampere back.

After the Finnish national team coach Henrik Dettmann 2009 was returned to the Division A of the best European national teams, was achieved in the additional round of qualifying for the European Championship finals in 2011 in Lithuania, the qualification for the finals tournament, which held for the first time with an expanded starting field of 24 teams been. At the tournament itself could reach the second round of the twelve best teams after victories over Montenegro and a significant success over Bosnia - Herzegovina in the first round.