By Lefteris Moutis/ moutis@eurohoops.net
Have you ever wondered which partnerships have worked the best in this year’s Turkish Airlines Euroleague? Which guards have formed such a relationship with their intended targets that they can work together even with their eyes closed? Eurohoops.net presents the best duo in the competition.
Every coach has many different scenarios in their playbooks. However, they know that some partnerships are more reliable, and when things get tough, when their team is fighting to score or needs a bucket in the final minutes of a crucial game, they usually trust a smaller group of players that can bail out the whole team. So Eurohoops.net singled out the best passers to see out where their assists come from, which is to say, which of their teammates benefits the most from their creative abilities. Of the duos that emerged, some were expected and others were surprises.
The only criteria is to do with the effectiveness of the partnership. For example, Milos Teodosic and Nando De Colo are sixth and eighth place, respectively on the list of most assists, but both dish out their assists to CSKA Moscow teammates in an even fashion. For comparison’s sake, the best partnership in the Euroleague last season was between Dimitris Diamantidis and Esteban Batista of Panathinaikos Athens, which resulted in 43 successful plays.
Malcolm Delaney –> Victor Claver, Lokomotiv Kuban Krasnodar
26 assists
Not only has Delaney scored 21% of Lokomotiv’s points (354 of 1686 in total), he has sent out 35% of the team’s assists (126 out of 361)! His favorite target appears to be Claver, who is the No. 2 scorer on the team.
Nick Calathes –> James Gist, Panathinaikos Athens
26 assists
Calathes is twice times on the list, which highlights his effectiveness. Gist has scored 26 times from a pass by Calathes and, as fans of the Greens know well, many of those finishes were in the form of impressive dunks.
Thomas Heurtel –> Bryant Dunston, Anadolu Efes Istanbul
28 assists
Heurtel leads the league with 168 assists, which explains why his name appears on the chart twice. Dunston has scored 28 times via Heurtel passes, showing that their partnership is at a high level.
Vassilis Spanoulis –> Georgios Printezis, Olympiacos Piraeus
28 assists
This duo is one of the longer running partnerships in the league and in many instances they seem as if they can find each other blindly. Most of Printezis’s 28 scores from Spanoulis came on pick-and-roll situations.
Alexey Shved –> James Augustine, Khimki Moscow Region
29 assists
Shved is by far Khimki’s top scorer (and third in the competition), but he’s just as effective as a creator. Twenty-nine of his passes have resulted in a basket by Augustine. Shved has dished 90 assists in total, wo the fact that nearly a third of them have been to one player is quite impressive.
Tyrese Rice –> James Augustine, Khimki Moscow Region
29 assists
Rice is Khimki’s second best scorer and top passer, and – like with Rice’s backcourt mate Shved – the main recipient of his assists is Augustine. In their last ten games, Rice has tallied 8.5 assists per game and Augustine has raised his point average within this period to 12.2, which is surely no coincidence.
Sergio Rodriguez –> Gustavo Ayon, Real Madrid
30 assists
By far the best partnership in Madrid is the one between Rodriguez, who is second in the league in assists, and Ayon, the player who is second-most accurate in the league in two-point shooting. In addition to his 30 scores via Rodriguez, Ayon has partnered with Sergio Llull another 23 times.
Nick Calathes –> Miroslav Raduljica, Panathinaikos Athens
35 assists
Calathes is third in the league in assists for the season and he owes some of that to Raduljica, with whom he has mastered playing the pick-and-roll. After Calathes, Raduljica has benefitted most from assists from Dimitris Diamantidis (14) and James Feldeine (13).