MIES (Switzerland) - Jose "Piculin" Ortiz was a giant in Puerto Rican sports as the center on the national team, playing in four Olympic Games and four FIBA Basketball World Cups.

The legendary Boricua, whose career spanned 26 years, is being inducted into the 2019 Class of the FIBA Hall of Fame.

Ortiz is among eight former players being enshrined into the Hall of Fame alongside Janeth Arcain (Brazil), Margo Dydek (Poland - posthumously), Atanas Golomeev (Bulgaria), Alonzo Mourning (United States), Fabricio Oberto (Argentina), Mohsen Medhat Warda (Egypt) and Jiri Zidek (Czech Republic). Joining them are coaches Natalia Hejkova (Slovak Republic), Bogdan Tanjevic (Montenegro) and Mou Zuoyun (China - posthumously). They were selected from a list of more than 150 candidates. 

"First of all, I want to thank God for this," he said. "Secondly, it's truly been an honor for me to have represented the island of Puerto Rico for so many years and I'm very grateful to be honored in this way.

"For any player, this would be an honor. I'm grateful to those people that considered my name among those selected."

The PAC-10 Player of the Year in 1987, Piculin that same year became the first Puerto Rico-born player to be selected in the NBA Draft. He was taken 15th overall by the Utah Jazz.

One year later and the 2.11m (6ft 11in) tower of power made his Olympic bow in Seoul and led his country in scoring at 12.5 points per game as they reached the Quarter-Finals.

Then at the FIBA Basketball World Cup 1990 in Argentina, Ortiz, prevented by injury from playing at the tournament four years earlier, averaged more than 18.0ppg and had huge  outings in two games against the United States, scoring 22 and 25 points, respectively. The Boricuas finished fourth at that tournament.

Beaten by the USA Dream Team in the Quarter-Finals of the 1992 Olympics, Puerto Rico had to settle for seventh place. A couple of years later, however, he provided much of the inspiration as Puerto Rico won gold at the Goodwill Games in Moscow.

Piculin played for his national team until the 2004 Olympics, where he took part in one of his country's most famous wins. Taking on a star-studded USA team, the big center had 8 points and 6 rebounds as the Boricuas stunned the USA on opening day, 92-73.

They would go on to reach the Quarter-Finals in that event, Piculin's last with his country.

Puerto Rico retired his No. 4.

The honor is even sweeter since he is in the same Hall of Fame class as a couple of former adversaries in international basketball, Alonzo Mourning of the United States and Fabricio Oberto of Argentina.

"The beauty of this is that even though we've had our victories and losses against each other, this unites us," he said.

 
The 2019 Class will be enshrined into FIBA's Hall of Fame during a special ceremony taking place in Beijing, China, on August 30, on the eve of the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2019 tipping off. 

FIBA