Nik Vucevic and Nikola Mirotic first played basketball against each other when they were 12 or 13 years old.
They remember almost everything about those early matchups in their home country of Montenegro.
Vucevic played for a club team called Mornar.
“He was a great shooter, believe me,” Mirotic recalls. “He was one of the best young players in our country.”
Mirotic played for a club team called the Joker School.
“He was taller than everybody,” Vucevic says. “He was good. You could just tell he had a lot of potential and he was scoring a lot and knew how to play.”
And look at them now: They’re both starring in the NBA. Vucevic is averaging 19.6 points and 11.2 rebounds per game as the Orlando Magic’s starting center. Mirotic has emerged as a key contributor for the Chicago Bulls and is a contender for Rookie of the Year honors.
They will play against each other for the fourth, and final, time this season when Vucevic’s Magic host Mirotic’s Bulls on Wednesday night at Amway Center.
The matchup will generate attention back home in Montenegro, a country a bit smaller in size than Connecticut. The nation of about 650,000 people is nestled against the Adriatic Sea and is encircled by Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Croatia, Kosovo and Albania.
Vucevic, Mirotic and Minnesota Timberwolves center Nikola Pekovic are stars back home. They are Montenegro’s only three players in the NBA.
They’re also good friends.
Pekovic, who is 29 years old, is the elder statesman of the group. He started playing in the NBA in 2010, and he mentored Vucevic when Vucevic joined the league a year later.
Although Vucevic, 24, is just three and a half months older than Mirotic, it’s now Vucevic’s turn to serve as a sounding board for Mirotic.
“Especially at the beginning of the season, we’d talk a lot, especially about me, because I had a lot of questions,” Mirotic says.
“He’s a great friend,” Mirotic added.
Vucevic was born in Switzerland and spent much of his childhood in Belgium because his father played professional basketball there.
But Vucevic’s family eventually settled in the coastal city of Bar, Montenegro, which overlooks the Adriatic.
Mirotic grew up in the nation’s capital, Podgorica, about an hour’s drive from Bar.
But neither Vucevic nor Mirotic stayed in their home country for very long.
Mirotic moved to Madrid at the age of 15 to join the club Real Madrid, a European powerhouse. He didn’t know any Spanish at the time.
“It’s good because that makes you tough, to be a tough guy,” Mirotic says in heavily accented English. “You learn a lot about your life to survive outside your country.”
When Vucevic was a month shy of his 17th birthday, he moved to Southern California to spend his senior year of high school at Stoneridge Preparatory School. He knew a bit of English, only what he had picked up from watching American movies and TV shows.
The transition was difficult, especially at first.
So Vucevic understands what Mirotic must’ve gone through in Madrid.
“Knowing what it took me to get to where I am, I definitely admire what he did,” Vucevic says. “He even left at a younger age to [go to] maybe the biggest team in Europe, the biggest club.
“There’s a lot of kids [there] with a lot of potential. And to make it through all that, it’s impressive. He was a foreign guy in a foreign country. It’s not always easy. He made it through. A lot people doubted him. . . . He fought through all that and he became a great player. You’ve got to admire it when somebody does it the way he did it.”
The sacrifices have been worth it.
In October, Vucevic signed a four-year contract extension that can pay him up to $53 million.
He’s also played well lately. On Friday, he scored a career-high 37 points in a win over the Timberwolves. One night later, he compiled 20 points, seven rebounds and five assists in a win over the Milwaukee Bucks.
“Defensively, he has gotten much better,” says the Magic’s interim coach, James Borrego. “He is challenging more shots. He’s a little more physical inside than what we’ve seen in the past. His challenge is to do that more consistently throughout a game. Offensively, we’re seeing a much more confident player.
“One of the biggest strides that we saw in that Milwaukee game is when he’s double-teamed or when a crowd is around him, he’s kicking it, making the right play, and he produced a lot of those open 3s for us in Milwaukee by just making the right play.”
Mirotic, a 6-foot-10 forward, is the reigning Eastern Conference Rookie of the Month. In March, he averaged 20.8 points, 7.6 rebounds and 1.2 blocks per game.
“I know it is tough as a rookie when you come here,” Vucevic says. “It’s not always easy. He was on a good team with a lot of good players, so his playing time wasn’t going to be consistent. I just told him to be patient.
“They had some injuries and he got a lot of playing time and he took advantage of it and he’s been playing great for a month or so. I’m really happy for him. He’s a guy that really works hard, that’s come a long way. So I’m very happy he’s doing very well.”
On Tuesday night, Vucevic likely will take Mirotic out to dinner in Orlando.
At some point during that meal, they might reminisce about the similar journeys they’ve taken.
In almost a decade’s time, they’ve gone from playing against each other as 12- or 13-year-olds in Montenegro to facing each other as 24-year-olds in the United States.
“It’s a good thing he’s now where he is in the NBA,” Mirotic says. “I’m here, too. So we did a great job.”
jrobbins@orlandosentinel.com. Read his blog at OrlandoSentinel.com/magicblog and follow him on Twitter at @JoshuaBRobbins.