By Cesare Milanti/ info@eurohoops.net
EuroBasket 2022 is getting closer. In Milan, Prague, Cologne, and Tbilisi we will see not only the main stars of the 24 national teams ready to fight to get on the European roof, but also some new faces: young and upcoming elements who will be the future of their respective teams, but also players at the height of their basketball maturity who have only reached a similar stage in this moment of their careers.
You would be surprised to know that Nikola Jokic is a Eurobasket rookie and the same applies to German youngster Franz Wagner, but they are both included in our Top 10 players of the competition, so they are not on this list.
So, let’s discover the Top 10 EuroBasket 2022 Rookies presented to you by Eurohoops. Be careful, because in 2017 a rookie was decisive to get Slovenia on the golden step of the podium. Luka Doncic, does that ring a bell?
Simone Fontecchio – Italy
Since he left the Italian championship, Simone Fontecchio has become an absolute star both in the EuroLeague and with the jersey of his national team. The experiences with ALBA Berlin first and Baskonia then made him a decisive player on the offensive end of the floor, with many solutions in his arsenal: you can’t leave him space on the perimeter, but a late close-out by the defense automatically turns into a basket for the new Utah Jazz player.
Decisive in bringing Italy back to the Olympic Games 17 years after the great run in Athens 2004, he wants to lead the team of Gianmarco Pozzecco to a EuroBasket medal that has been missing since 2003.
Alperen Sengun – Turkey
A guy born on 25 June 2002 who between 2020 and 2021 dominated a championship in which you could have found players such as Shane Larkin, Vasilije Micic, Chris Wright, Mouhammadou Jaiteh, Kyle Wiltjer, and Nando de Colo? The answer is easy and immediate: Alperen Sengun, who since that season as MVP in Turkey has taken flight.
Landed in America with the #16 pick of the 2021 NBA Draft by the Houston Rockets, he showed immediately to be ready for a similar stage, without fear of making mistakes or awe towards his more experienced colleagues, perhaps Americans. In the first NBA season, he averaged 9.6 points, 5.5 rebounds, and 2.6 assists per game, with spectacular plays in the low and high post.
Basically, the modern big par excellence, since he can do everything: equipped with an excellent dribble, he shoots very well and he can use the physical advantage as few of his peers in the world. Turkey will lay its foundations on Osman, Korkmaz, and Larkin, but it is the youngest that will have to pass if Ergin Ataman wants a medal.
Lorenzo Brown – Spain
Much has been said about the naturalization of Lorenzo Brown, which allowed him to be present on the Spanish roster coached by Sergio Scariolo for EuroBasket 2022, and we will not analyze this controversial situation again. As for his presence on the court, the new Maccabi Tel Aviv point guard will be crucial for a team that will perform without its vintage directors: Sergio Rodriguez and Ricky Rubio.
In the last season with UNICS Kazan, before the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, he was without any doubt one of the best in his role in the EuroLeague, with very interesting numbers: 13.8 points, 3.6 rebounds, and 6.1 assists per game leading one of the most entertaining teams to watch in the European landscape. He is probably experiencing the best moment of his career and Spanish hopes pass from his decisions.
Ignas Brazdeikis – Lithuania
Lithuania has always given the impression of being a high-level team in recent FIBA competitions, with two of the most talented bigs in the world, Domantas Sabonis and Jonas Valanciunas, and an external package with players with high basketball IQ. What was missing, however, was an X Factor that could really change their trajectories ahead of EuroBasket 2022.
Ignas Brazdeikis, raised in Canada by a Lithuanian family, will finally have the opportunity to debut in international competition so important with this jersey on: “I’ve always dreamed about playing for Lithuania at this stage. Feels great to finally be here,” he said in an interview with FIBA. Not only that, but after trying the NBA road, from next season he will play in the EuroLeague with Zalgiris Kaunas. Another return to a past that he has never experienced, but that he wants to try to emerge shaping his future.
The prohibitive Group B with direct competition from France and Slovenia? Probably just another challenge for Brazdeikis: “It’s going to make it that much more fun. We’re all very excited to compete and go at the best. That’s what we want,” he said.
Deni Avdija – Israel
For two consecutive years, he has been at the top of international youth basketball, seeing the gold medals won in the FIBA U20 European Championships both in 2018 and 2019 (where he was voted MVP in front of his audience). Now, two years after his arrival in the NBA, selected by the Washington Wizard with the number #9 pick in the 2020 NBA Draft, he is the main focus of the senior squad.
Israeli Championship MVP in 2019/2020, when he left Maccabi Tel Aviv everyone was confident that he would be the face of basketball in Israel in the near and distant future. And indeed, if Guy Pnini’s team wants to show its full potential, they will have to rely on a star like Deni Avdija.
This will not only be his first EuroBasket, but also the opportunity to see him return to action with his national team for the first time since the moment he began his adventure in the NBA. As they say, welcome home.
Tyler Dorsey – Greece
One of the main shortcomings for Greece in the last major FIBA competitions, such as the 2019 World Cup, was the presence of scorers who could make important shots when the motion on offense was stuck, possibly from the perimeter.
In a team that boasted the presence of many great players with little shooting range, Giannis Antetokounmpo on all, it was necessary to bring in an element able to solve this puzzle. Tyler Dorsey, who just came from a great season at Olympiacos and is about to play alongside Luka Doncic with the Dallas Mavericks, is a great answer to this question.
Born in Pasadena to an Israeli-Greek mother in 2015 he decided to represent the Greeks, debuting with the U19 national team. Excluded from the world expedition in 2019 despite showing good things with the Atlanta Hawks and the Memphis Grizzlies, he has steadily improved first in Tel Aviv and now in Athens. Dimitris Itoudis is counting on him for his first EuroBasket.
Guerschon Yabusele – France
The boy criticized for his choice to land in China before the NBA experience with the Boston Celtics has become one of the most fearsome and versatile power forwards of the entire European panorama. Since Guerschon Yabusele returned to Europe to play with ASVEL Villeurbanne in 2020, in fact, he has always been a puzzle to solve for the opposing defenses.
Last summer was probably the richest for him from a professional point of view: a silver in Tokyo with France and the arrival at Real Madrid, in which he was an essential element for successes in both ACB League and EuroLeague. Now Vincent Collet can’t do without him.
Alexander Vezenkov – Bulgaria
Considered one of the best prospects in Europe in his early years in the youth teams of APOEL and Aris Thessaloniki, Alexander Vezenkov did not meet great expectations when he debuted with FC Barcelona’s Xavi Pascual.
At the end of a season as an absolute protagonist (he won the Greek Championship and the Greek Cup, he was inserted in the 2021/2022 All-EuroLeague First Team and he got the MVP of the Greek Championship) with his Olympiacos, however, Sasha does not want to stop taking satisfaction even on the sunset of the summer.
If Bulgaria will overtake Group A with conviction, it will be mainly thanks to Dee Bost and him: at 27, he wants to make his mark in his first EuroBasket participation.
Jusuf Nurkic – Bosnia
Before Dzanan Musa established himself as one of the best small forwards of the Old Continent, with a stellar season at the Rio Breogan followed by the call of Real Madrid, there was no doubt about who would have been the drag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Despite being in the NBA since 2014, first with the Denver Nuggets and since 2017 alongside Damian Lillard in Portland, Jusuf Nurkic will debut at EuroBasket only in a few days, trying to help his national team in a real undertaking: try to overtake Group B, where Slovenia, France, Lithuania, Germany, and Hungary await them.
Sandro Mamukelashvili – Georgia
Since his youth years at Pallacanestro Biella, it was clear that this boy born in New York but raised in Tbilisi would have had a bright future ahead of him. When the collegiate experience in Seton Hall, which came after Montverde Academy, where the compatriot Zaza Pachulia had taken him under his protective wing, was over and the Milwaukee Bucks selected him in the 2021 NBA Draft, it was understood that fate had taken its course.
Alexander “Sandro” Mamukelashvili will be one of the lighthouses of Georgia, which will have to do without Tornike Shengelia, injured in the 2023 FIBA World Cup qualifying match against the Netherlands.
The McFadden-Shermadini axis brings experience, but it is here that the 1999 class brings freshness and new offensive solutions as the probable starting power forward of this team. The impression is that he will do well.