Nikita is coming off the Army Men junior project where he played from 2002 to 2005. After winning gold and MVP title of U20 European Championship in Chekhov Kurbanov started his pro career on loan to Lokomotiv Rostov but came back to CSKA during the same season. He played for our team until 2012 with a year brake of loan to UNICS Kazan and Spartak St.Petersburg (2008-09).
Kurbanov played in 238 games (17 starts) in red-and-blue uniform averaging 4.0 points, 2.2 rebounds, 0.6 assists, 0.5 steals, 0.2 blocked-shots in 11.0 minutes.
After leaving CSKA Nikita played for Spartak, UNICS and Lokomotiv-Kuban. He was one of the key players for Krasnodar team last season when he averaged 8.7 points, 3.9 rebounds, 1.3 assists, 0.9 steals, 0.8 blocked shots and 25.3 minutes in 20 Eurocup games, 8.2 points, 3.9 rebounds, 1.4 assists, 0.8 steals, 0.2 blocked shots and 24.2 minutes in 38 VTB United League games. Kurbanov was one of the heroes of Eurobasket qualifiers last year: he led the Russian National Team in playing time (27.5) and rebounds (8.5), was second in assists (2.8) and third in scoring (9.5).
Dimitris Itoudis, CSKA head coach:
We are happy to have Nikita back to CSKA. In recent years he proved that he belongs to the top. Kurbanov gives us size, explosiveness, motivation and aggressiveness on position of small forward. We’ve already talked and he is very enthusiastic about his comeback.
