The world of basketball in Spain mourns the death of one of their most historic players and coaches, José Manuel Monsalve, known as Moncho Monsalve, who passed away at the age of 81. Described by Real Madrid as one of their great legends, Monsalve won three league titles, 3 Spanish Cups and 3 European Cups between 1963 and 1967. He also played 61 matches with Spain, and won silver medal at the 1963 Mediterranean Games.
However, his career was cut short and retired in 1971, at the age of 26, due to several injuries, but started working as a coach almost immediately, training for Barcelona, Zaragoza, Murcia, Málaga, among many others, and even the national teams of Morocco, Domincan Republic and Brazil, winning, among other titles, the FIBA Americas Championship for Men with Brazil.
He continued working until his final years as coach for the young teams of the UCAM Murcia, and was also part of the technical staff of the Spanish Basketball Federation as well as pundit, and was included in the Hall of Fame of Spanish Basketball.