Sportando European Team of the Week: Week of June 10

Take a good look at the members of this edition of the Sportando Team of the Week – because most, with the exception of that guy in San Antonio, could well have played their final game with their respective clubs. Below runs a couple squads’ worth of excellent individual performances from a week which saw VTB United, French, Romanian and other league close for 2012-13. (And yeah, the point guards dominate the roster – we guess they call ‘em “playmakers” for a reason…)

First team

 
Julius Jenkins, PG, helped cap EWE Baskets Oldenburg’s Bundesliga semifinal series against Ratiopharm Ulm with a huge 27 points – including 14 in the second quarter – and seven boards last Thursday, an effort which iced his naming as player of the round. Jenkins’ shot was a bit off in game one of the championship series two days later, but he still managed to score 15 in his side’s loss to Brose Baskets Bamberg – we’re looking to Julius to bounce back in game two…

Video: Samples from Jenkins’ barrage of Oldenburg

Alhaji Mohammed, G, CSU Asesoft Ploiesti. Heck of a game Nazr’s younger brother played last Monday – featuring prolific shooting, to say the least. How about 38 points in 34 minutes based on 13-and-22 overall and 9-of-13 FT shooting? And the effort came at an ideal time for Ploiesti, too, as the Romanian club took its ninth league title in 10 seasons.

Video: Another Ploiesti championship celebrated

Sonny Weems, G/F, CSKA Moscow. Last week’s grueling VTB United League championship series schedule – four matches in five days, plus travel between games two and three – created a lot of ragged-looking, uneven play from most of CSKA and opponents Lokomotiv Kuban. Sonny stood out in the series’ concluding game four, taking over the offense to go 8-of-16 overall for 24 points in the 59-54 grinder. Also of note: Weems’ crucial all-around effort (13 points, five rebounds, three assists) in CSKA’s game three win.

VTB League video: Meanwhile, Sonny holds court with a “master class”

Furkan Aldemir, PF, Galatasaray. Last Wednesday, Aldemir showed he could help control the middle with his 12 rebounds (including five offensive!) and 4-of-5 shooting. On Friday, the Galatasaray game plan saw Aldemir getting more touches and subsequently running up 15 points on 7-of-8 to go with eight boards (including, yes, five offensive!) – the result was a healthy 2-0 lead for his team going into tonight’s TBL finals game three at Banvit BK. Are the Houston Rockets paying attention at all?

Video: Aldemir finishes one off

Andrey Vorontsevich, C, CSKA Moscow. Again: It wasn’t pretty, but the VTB League championship series was terrific if you love battles for the boards. CSKA ultimately outrebounded Kuban in games two through four on the way to the title; leading the team in all three games was Vorontsevich. And how huge were his nine boards for the Khyrapa-less Moscow in the final game?

Sixth man

Sergio Rodriguez, PG. After one game in the Liga Endesa championship series, Real Madrid is primed to avenge its Copa del Rey defeat and cap an otherwise successful season for the storied franchise. A nice story resulting game one in this edition “El Clasico” was Sergio’s show after not seeing action for over a week: Rodriguez applied dagger after dagger to the flailing Barca in the fourth quarter, sending home nine points on the way to his game-high 21. Bravo, Sergio!  

ACB video: Lots of Rodriguez (and Rudy and Llull) against Barcelona in game one

Second team

OK, so Tony Parker, PG, looked mortal on Sunday night when the Miami Heat blew up against his San Antonio Spurs in the second half of game two of the NBA championship series. As though a mere 13 points on 5-of-14 shooting plus five TOs wasn’t bad enough, his best pass of the night resulted in Lebron James’ mammoth rejection of Tiago Splitter. (Seriously, check out the replay for some lightning-quick needle-threading.) But – there was also his superhuman performance on Thursday. We’re not ready to knock TP off the European Team of the Week yet…

Video: Parker going off in game one

Video: A beautiful pass obliterated from memory by Lebron

Mike Green, PG, Cimberio Varese. Green’s efforts in Varese’s valiantly fought seven-game series in the Serie A semifinals against powerhouse Montepaschi Siena are definitely of note. Green’s 16.7 ppg average over three matches last week peaked in his team’s final victory of 2012-13, the 82-80 game six win in which Green contributed a neat 20 points, 10 rebounds and five assists.

Video: Three Green assists in series Top 10 plays clip

David Lighty, G/F, Nanterre, chased up a ho-hum performance on Tuesday by taking charge in France’s LNB championship series game four. With 19 points and a couple of steals, Lighty helped cap an incredible 7-1 playoff run – and incredibly, a Euroleague bid – for the unheralded no. 8 seed.

Video: The Cinderella story continues

Jamont Gordon, G/F. Among Galatasaray’s crowd of familiar faces in European leagues, Gordon may have been the steadiest in the first two games of the TBL final, averaging 17.0 points and 5.5 rebounds per.

Video: Galatasaray-Banvit game one highlights

Derrick Brown, F, Lokomotiv Kuban. Amid his team’s losing effort in the VTB, Brown was a model of consistency closing out the season, with three consecutive double-figure scores and 5.0 rebounds per game. And in game one, Brown turned in a freaky five steals.

Video: Brown the highlight maestro of the finals, with two of top five plays

Honorable mention

Theo Papaloukas made the intentions stated in May official after CSKA’s VTB League championship win, namely that he would be retiring from professional basketball altogether. The list of awards and trophies bestowed upon Papaloukas is way too long to list here, but we may note his 2006 FIBA Europe player of the Year award and 2007 Euroleague MVP nod, four all-Euroleague team bids and naming to the Euroleague All-Decade Team. Supporters in Moscow and Greece are sure to recall many fond memories of Theo’s mastery, but any European basketball devotee will miss the man…

Video: Theo Papaloukas – The “Ultimate” CSKA Mix

– compiled by Os Davis 

Os Davis writes/posts/tweets for the ESPN TrueHoop Network site BallinEurope.com. He also co-produces the mostly European basketball-centered weekly podcast Taking the Charge with heinnews.com, and watches way too much basketball through online subscription packages and dodgy live streams

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