By Eurohoops team / info@eurohoops.net
Jordan Loyd’s career-high led Crvena Zvezda to victory over Baskonia and was enough to earn him Round 2’s MVP honors.
Per EuroLeague:
Crvena Zvezda mts Belgrade looked for a go-to leader in its first home game and Jordan Loyd responded with a performance worth the MVP honor for Round 2 of the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague Regular Season. Loyd matched Zvezda’s second-best scoring total ever in the club’s 151 EuroLeague games to lead Zvezda to a resounding 90-73 win over visiting TD Systems Baskonia Vitoria-Gasteiz.
Making 5 of 8 three-pointers and 9 perfect free throws among his 30 points, Loyd added 6 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 steals on the way to a 34 performance index rating, the best on any winning team in Round 2.
Krunoslav Simon had the same PIR for Anadolu Efes Istanbul but his 24 points, 5 rebounds and 4 assists could not prevent a 71-80 home loss to Fenerbahce Beko Istanbul.
The third-best performance of the week belonged to Jonas Jerebko of Khimki Moscow Region, who had 23 points, 12 rebounds and a PIR of 30 in undermanned team’s 70-84 home loss to Zalgiris Kaunas. Rounding out the list of top performers in Round 2 were two classic guards with PIRs of 28 each. Fenerbahce’s Nando De Colo collecting 20 points, 7 rebounds, 4 assists and 3 steals in his team’s big win over Efes. And Mike James keyed CSKA Moscow’s 76-72 home win over Maccabi Playtika Tel Aviv with 25 points, 3 assists and 2 rebounds.
Individual highs: Octavius Ellis, 13 rebounds
Loyd led Round 2 with 30 points and is the EuroLeague’s overall top scorer after two games with 22.5 per game. Olympiacos big man Octavius Ellis outrebounded everyone in Round 2 with a career-high 13 boards. Jonas Jerebko of Khimki Moscow Region has a league-high average of 10.5 rebounds so far. In just his second EuroLeague game, Langston Hall of Zvezda dished 11 assists, the most in Round 2. Malcolm Delaney of AX Armani Exchange Milan and Pierria Henry of Baskonia top the assists charts after two games with 8.0 per game. Six players had 3 steals this round: Henry, De Colo, Guillem Vives of Valencia, Vasilije Micic of Efes, Scottie Wilbekin of Maccabi, and Sergio Rodriguez of Milan. Nikola Mirotic of FC Barcelona and Janis Timma of Khimki average a league-high 3.0 steals this season. Real’s Usman Garuba had 3 blocks, more than any other player in Round 2. Zenit’s Arturas Gudaitis and Khimki’s Jordan Mickey are the early season shot-blocking leaders with 3.0 per contest. There were three double-doubles this round, all in points and rebounds: Jerebko had 23 and 12, Alex Poythress of Zenit St Petersburg had 16 and 11, and Fenerbahce’s Vesely had 13 and 10.