Giannis Ioannidis

Giannis Ioannidis (alternate spellings: Ioannis, Yiannis, Yannis) (Greek: Γιάννης Ιωαννίδης; born 26 February 1945 in Thessaloniki, Greece) is a former Greek basketball player, professional basketball coach, and Greece New Democracy (ND) politician.
He is generally considered to be the best Greek basketball head coach of all-time, since he is the one with the most major Greek national titles won (18 in total, 13 with Aris, and 5 with Olympiacos).
Biography.
Ioannidis was born in Thessaloniki, and studied Agriculture in the Faculty of Geotechnical Sciences at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. He is married and has one daughter.
Basketball career.
Playing career.
During his youth, Ioannidis became a member of the youth clubs of Aris, in 1959. He joined the senior men's team of Aris, of the Greek Basket League, in 1960. He played with Aris in the Greek League, until 1978, when he retired. With 4,970 points scored as a member of Aris, he is the second highest scorer of all-time in the history of the club, after Nikos Galis.
Coaching career.
Still in his playing years, Ioannidis agreed to assume the head coach position at Cretan club Ergotelis in 1977, after being offered the job by longtime friend and fellow Aristotle University of Thessaloniki student Manolis Nikiforakis. Travelling back and forth between Thessaloniki and Crete, Ioannidis managed to promote the club to the Greek B Basket League.
After retiring from playing basketball, Ioannidis became a full-time basketball coach. He eventually became the head coach of Aris, and with the club, he won a total of 8 Greek League championships, and 5 Greek Cups. With Aris, he also participated at 3 consecutive FIBA European Champions' Cup (now called EuroLeague) Final Fours. Later, he coached Olympiacos, where he won 4 consecutive Greek League championships, 1 Greek Cup, and participated at 2 consecutive FIBA EuroLeague Finals.
He was the architect of the most glorious victory of Olympiacos, which came against Panathinaikos, in the last game of the 1995–96 Greek League Finals, with a winning score of 73-38. That was his last game coaching with Olympiacos at that time. The next year, he joined AEK, where he stayed for 2 seasons, and with them he managed to reach one more Final of the FIBA EuroLeague. After a short come-back to Olympiacos, he finished his coaching career with the senior men's Greek national basketball team, which he coached at the EuroBasket 2003.
Political career.
Ioannidis announced his retirement from professional basketball in the year 2004, before he was elected a New Democracy MP for the Thessaloniki A constituency in the 2004 general election, and re-elected in 2007. Since September 2007, he has been Deputy Minister Of Culture Responsible for Sports.
In the 2014 regional election, he challenged incumbent Apostolos Tzitzikostas as Regional Governor of Central Macedonia, after Tzitzikostas had lost his party's support. He was however clearly defeated in the second round. At the January 2015 legislative election, he also lost his parliamentary seat.