Alexander Volkov (basketball)

Oleksandr Anatoliyovych Volkov (Олександр Анатолійович Волков; born 29 March 1964), commonly known as Sasha Volkov, is a retired Ukrainian professional basketball player. He was born in Omsk, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union. At 6'10" (2.08 m) tall, he played at the power forward and center positions. He was versatile with the ball and quick on his feet, which made him a very sought after player.

Professional career
Volkov played professionally for Stroitel (1981–1986; 1988–1989), CSKA Moscow (1986–1988), Atlanta Hawks (1989–1992), Panasonic Reggio Calabria (1992–1993), Panathinaikos (1993–1994), Olympiacos (1994–1995), and Kyiv (2000–2002).

In the USSR, he was also selected MVP in 1989, and was one of the key players on the Soviet national team since 1985, winning the gold medal at the 1988 Seoul Games.

In 1986, he was drafted by the Atlanta Hawks in the 6th round, together with CSKA Moscow teammate Valeri Tikhonenko. Fellow Soviet player Arvydas Sabonis was also drafted late in the first round. This was the second NBA draft when Soviet players were selected, after Alexander Belov was drafted in 1975. Volkov signed with the Hawks three years later on 1 August 1989. His brief career in NBA was hampered by injury as well as competition from several all-star front-men: Dominique Wilkins, Kevin Willis and Moses Malone. Volkov averaged 5 points and close to 2 rebounds per game during his first (89-90) season. After missing the whole next season, he came back stronger, roughly doubling his statistical output on the floor and even starting in 27 games. Afterwards, he chose to continue his career in Europe.

He was one of the founders of BC Kyiv. Volkov, who had already retired from playing in 1995, returned to play several games, to help the newly found team in 2000. He later also served as the team's President.

National team career
Volkov won a gold medal at the 1988 Summer Olympics, as a member of the senior Soviet Union national basketball team. He also briefly came out of retirement, to play for the senior Ukrainian national basketball team, in 1998.

Political career
From 1999 to 2000, Volkov served as a chairman of the State Committee on Sports in Ukraine. In June 2007, he was elected the head of the Ukrainian Basketball Federation.

Volkov was elected to the Ukrainian Parliament in 2006 on the party list of the Our Ukraine Bloc. But against the will of his faction, he joined the Anti-Crisis Coalition, which prompted early elections. In the early parliamentary elections in 2007 he was reelected to Parliament through the Party of Regions. Volkov was again elected through the Party of Regions to the Ukrainian Parliament in 2012. But left this party's faction in parliament on 17 April 2014. and joined the (then new) faction Economic Development one week later. In the 2014 Ukrainian parliamentary election Volkov failed to get reelected into parliament; he was number 9 on the election list of Strong Ukraine, but the party won only one constituency parliamentary seat.

Personal life
In 2022, following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Volkov joined Ukrainian volunteers fighting against Russian forces. Volkov's family home in Chernihiv was destroyed by the bombings.