By Aris Barkas/ barkas@eurohoops.net
Five players and their teams are just getting started in Slovenia and five others will remember the first five games of the tournament as a high point in their national teams career, but ultimately couldn’t save the day. Eurohoops selected ten stars that already shined in Eurobasket 2013 and presents them to you.
Best five qualified
1. Tony Parker: No suprise here. The biggest star of the tournament is already delivering, being the natural leader of France, the best scorer left standing (18.8 ppg) while he is also dishing 4.8 assists and commiting only 1,6 turnovers. He can go all the way and he is the prime candidate for the MVP award.
2. Bojan Bogdanovic: The Croatian is a pure shooter and he has his career best scoring average yet in a national team tournament (17 p.), despite the fact that his three point shooting percentage is low for his standards (28%). He also grabs 5 rpg.
3. Marco Belinelli: With Andrea Bargnani and Danilo Gallinari out of the tournament, Belinelli stepped out from their shadow and he leads a young and exciting Italian team to greatness while scoring 15.8 ppg on 38.9% three point shooting.
4. Nemanja Bjelica: An other player who is shooting below his standards (20% on threes), but he is still the glue of Serbia, having 11 ppg, 7,2 rpg and 1 apg.
5. Marc Gasol: Nothing really fancy yet, however his stats (10.4 ppg, 8.4 rpg, 2 apg) don’t reflect his regal presence on the paint. Spain has the best defense in the tournament and Gasol, the defensive player of the year in the NBA, has a lot to do with that.
Best five who will be missed
1. Bo McCalebb: FYROM’s miracle will not be repeated and while his numbers this time have dropped a little, still Bo did what Bo does with 17,6 points, 3,2 rebounds and 1,6 assists.
2. Jeffery Taylor: The top scorer of Eurobasket couldn’t lead Sweden to the second round. He had 21.2 ppg, got help only from fellow NBAer Jonas Jerebko and he also grabbed 4.6 rpg. We use him as a shooting guard, because of the next guys on the list.
3. Mirza Teletovic: He left the Eurobasket with a bang, 31 points on 6/14 – crazy – three point shots against Lithuania and he was the second leading scoring of the tournament (21 ppg) and had also 7.6 rpg. At least let’s hope that the Nets were watching what he did with Bosnia.
4. Jan Vesely: An other player coming from a mediocre season in the NBA, proved in Eurobasket that the talent is still there with 17 ppg, 11.2 rpg, 1 apg and 1,8 spg. Czech Republic until the last game was competing for the second round, but couldn’t get past Croatia.
5. Tibor Pleiss: His German teammates, Schaffartzik and Benzing, are always worth a mention, however he proved that he is ready to blossom, averaging 11,6 ppg, 11 rpg and 1.6 bpg.