On July 13, Parma announced the signing of defender Alex Hamilton. The 30-year-old American finished last season with Israeli side Hapoel Haifa. “Championato” talks about a newcomer from Perm.
Alex Hamilton was born on October 5, 1993 in Marianna, Florida. It was in this same environment that he began his basketball career, playing at Chipley School. Before his debut season in the NCAA, he had offers from Auburn, Georgia, Middle Tennessee State, Murray State, Vanderbilt and Georgia State, among others. However, Hamilton chose the Louisiana Tech program.
Alex Hamilton
Photo: latechsports.com
In his first season in the NCAA, Alex was a role player coming off the bench. However, in the next three seasons he started every game and was the leading scorer. In his final season in college, Hamilton averaged 19.8 points, 5.7 rebounds and 6.2 assists. Throughout his college career, pundits predicted his place in the NBA one way or another, but he was never drafted.
In 2016, after graduation, Alex received an offer from the Golden State farm club in the NBA Development League. He played for the Santa Cruz Warriors for a season and a half. In the 2017/2018 season, by the way, he played for the “Warriors” farm club under the leadership of Aaron Miles, former player of Samara Red Wings and Lokomotiv Krasnodar. However, during the same season, Hamilton ended up in the Windy City Bulls, the Chicago farm club.
But even after two seasons in the NBA Development League, Alex never got a chance to test himself in the strongest league in the world, after which he decided to go to Europe.
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Hamilton’s first club outside the United States was Lithuanian Juventus, where the American immediately became a leader. It is symbolic that his teammate at that time was Russian Alexander Zakharov, who this offseason moved from Uralmash to Parma. Thus, next season, Hamilton and Zakharov will again play in the same team.
Already during his debut season in Europe, Hamilton caught the eye of the Israeli club and moved to Maccabi from Rishon. He spent the following season there as well. Alex continued to progress and started the 2020/2021 season at Turkish side Galatasaray. However, during that championship he moved to German side Bonn. Later in Hamilton’s career there were Hapoel Eliat, a return to Lithuanian side Juventus and Polish side Sea Wolves.
Alex Hamilton spent the 2023/2024 season in Israel again. He started the championship with Maccabi Ramat, after which he moved to Hapoel Haifa. For the latter club, the American played 13 games, averaging 12.6 points, 6.5 assists, 5.1 rebounds and 1.5 steals. In the summer of 2024, Alex Hamilton became a Parma player, playing in the VTB United League.
Alex Hamilton
Photo: From Hamilton’s personal archive.
The 30-year-old American is an experienced basketball player with a wide arsenal of skills. He is useful both in his own half of the court and in someone else’s. Hamilton is a versatile basketball player who focuses on more than just scoring points. Alex strives to bring maximum benefit to the team, including his work on the boards and assists, and his statistics only confirm this thesis. But of course, the main threat comes from him on offense. Hamilton’s strengths are dribbling and scoring. However, when possible, he does not hesitate to shoot from long distance.
It is obvious that Hamilton is joining Parma to replace the deceased Isaiah Reese and, in fact, they have a similar style of play. At the same time, from the outside it seems that Alex is even more athletic than Reese. Hamilton can play as a number one and as a number two. But the presence of Garrett Navels at Parma suggests that Evgeny Pashutin will use Alex as a point guard.
Parma have signed another top-quality foreign player and have hinted that they are not planning to lower the bar after last season’s shock. The Permians have three more foreign places left, and it is quite possible that the Urals will not enter the season with the maximum number of foreigners allowed, but will instead strengthen as the championship progresses. The Permians are currently made up of the following:
defenders: Hamilton, Nevels, Yakushin, Tuchkov, Egorov;forward: Ruzhentsev, Ilnitsky, Morozov, Zakharov, Svinin;center: Hamm, Shashkov, Khalturin, Firsov.
