The Great 2017 EuroBasket NBA Manifesto

Everything you need to know from EuroBasket, with deep dives on Luka Doncic, Lauri Markkanen, Kristaps Porzingis, and others

There were 76 EuroBasket games in Finland, Israel, Hungary, and Turkey over the past three weeks and I watched about 60 of them so you didn’t have to. For a basketball-starved fan, this was a sweet summer oasis. EuroBasket is not NBA Summer League or Big3 basketball. These are good well-coached professional European players in their primes, and the competition level was intense with huge raucous crowds and great game play.

The tournament started with 24 teams in four round-robin groups, followe d by a 16-team knockout tournament that ultimately saw Goran Dragic and Luke Doncic’s Slovenia triumph over Bogdan Bogdanovic and Serbia in the final. This is as close as it gets to NBA-level competition, and most of the teams had at least one great player, so I did some scouting, focusing on players with NBA talent.

I wrote about five key young talents and five veterans you’ll see a lot of soon, then went around Europe with thoughts on anyone else of note. You’ll definitely want to read about potential #1 pick Luka Doncic, Bulls franchise player Lauri Markkanen, the Unicorn Kristaps Porzingis, and a couple “rookie” wings that could make a big impact for the Cavs and Kings this year.

By all means, please like and share and highlight away. Let me know any questions or thoughts in the comments.

There’s a lot here. Feel free to Ctrl+F for a player’s name or break it up into sections. Consult a physician if this takes you longer than four hours to read. And if you like this stuff, here’s my scouting report from the 2017 NBA Summer League. Enjoy!

Five Huge Young Talents You Need to Know

Luka Doncic, Slovenia

You’re going to want to get to know the name Luka Doncic if you don’t already. Doncic helped lead his European nation with the population of New Mexico to their first EuroBasket title ever, and he did it all at the tender age of 18. The next time most NBA fans see Doncic will be their first, and it might be as the #1 overall pick at the 2018 NBA Draft.

Do I have your attention? Good, because Doncic certainly has mine. He started out with a triple-ocho against Poland, a tidy 11/8/8 line. Against Ukraine, Doncic dominated the first quarter with 10 points and four boards and threw up a 14/9/6 to carry the team with Goran Dragic struggling. In the semifinals against Spain, Doncic had a silly 11/12/8 line with a near triple-double, dominating the game when he wasn’t even hitting shots. These are the sort of lines we marvel at in the NBA, and they’re what Doncic was doing in his first few games at EuroBasket at the highest level.

Doncic is 6'8 and could end up playing the one, two, or three, or floating between any of the positions. He was a secondary handler most of the time for Slovenia, with Dragic at point, but often ran the bench unit and looked very good doing it. Doncic has a basketball IQ that is simply off the charts for an 18-year-old. He might not be quite as deadly a transition passer as Lonzo Ball, but he’s probably the better passer overall because of the way he sees and understands the game as it’s processing.

Doncic is terrific in pick-and-roll, an incredibly rare read-and-react ability for a player so young. He has a confident quick-release shot he’s willing to take off the PNR, or he can drive and dish, and at times he was quick to reset and use a second or third read, too. Doncic’s height is a real boon, and it’s clear how much it helps him see over defenders. He can always get his shot off, and it helps him find passing angles most other players can’t see. Over and over again, Doncic would come off a screen going one way and suddenly whip the ball to the opposite corner for an open three, that rare LeBron ability to make a pass most other players don’t even see.

Doncic is a good but not great athlete, with athleticism good enough at EuroBasket but that will leave him lacking against some NBA players. He uses his size well, again especially for a player of his age, and he is solid in defense where his high IQ helps him read a play and get to the right spot even if he doesn’t have elite athleticism to make the stop. He’s not going to be a great defender, but it looks like he can be adequate, and his size should allow him to switch between a few positions defensively.

It’s amazing how well Doncic fills out the box score, even without demanding a ton of shots or running the point. One of the most impressive things about him was that he finished fourth in EuroBasket with 8.1 rebounds per game, despite playing most of his minutes as a guard. Per 40 minutes, Doncic averaged 20 points, 11 boards, and 5 assists. That combination of production is almost unprecedented at an NBA level. It’s reminiscent of someone like Larry Bird or John Havlicek, at worst a rich man’s Nicolas Batum. Few players in history can combine Doncic’s rebounding, passing, and shooting prowess. Those are absurd names to compare an 18-year-old to, but Doncic is a unique prospect with a high ceiling, one Kevin Pelton is calling the best Euro prospect ever.

To hit that ceiling, Doncic will need to improve as a shooter and on defense. He finished Euros averaging 14 points a game on 41% field goals and 31% from downtown, and both of those marks need to go up. The shot looks good, but he’ll need to hit it consistently to make up for his lack of high-end athleticism in the NBA. The defense should come along as he continues to learn the game even better.

Another thing that stands out about Doncic is that he is a gamer, fearless in the biggest moments. You saw the line he put up against Spain in the biggest game of his life (11 points, 12 boards, 8 assists), and he did it shooting 3-of-10. Instead of getting frustrated his shot wouldn’t fall and mentally checking out, Doncic upped the ante everywhere else and still made a huge impact. Against Latvia, Doncic was huge on the boards and terrific down the stretch. He went right at Porzingis and scored over him on one play, then hit back-to-back stone cold threes in the fourth quarter, including a crossover step-back over Porzingis. If that wasn’t enough, Doncic sank two pressure free throws in the final seconds to ice the game.

Doncic is the whole package. He is absolutely the #1 pick in next year’s NBA draft until someone else comes and takes it from him. He has an extremely high floor and looks like he’ll play in the NBA for a long time, and his combination of shooting, passing, size, and rebounding are unlike most players in league history. And he’s already a leader, which is really saying something when you’re 18 and sharing the court with an NBA player in his final tournament as your country’s basketball legend.

Doncic was an absolute joy to watch, right down to the final moments when he was carried off the court by his teammates (he sprained his ankle in the final, but still) and celebrated at center stage as he celebrated a championship. Nine months from now on draft night, a slew of NBA fans might be dreaming about Doncic doing the same for their team some day, too.

Lauri Markkanen, Finland

Markkanen was awful in the first hour of the opening game at EuroBasket. He looked skinny and fragile and got pushed around and out-muscled any time he got a touch or went for a rebound. The Timberwolves fan in me chuckled at my delight that we’d avoided the guy everyone mocked to Minnesota for Jimmy Butler instead, and the Bulls fan in me sighed heavily as I watched visual confirmation of everything that had made Markkanen my least favorite top ten prospect in a loaded draft.

And then the fourth quarter happened. Out of nowhere, Markkanen exploded for 14 points over the final four minutes of regulation and overtime. He had a tip dunk and swished an open three, and his best move was receiving the ball behind the arc, pump faking, taking a dribble, and confidently sinking an open jumper. Finland came way back to shock France, the crowd went ballistic, and a star was born.

Markkanen scored 20 a game for Finland on 53% shooting with 48% from downtown, and there was more Markkanen magic to come. Against Poland, Lauri scored the final five points in regulation to send the game to overtime. Then he backed down a smaller defender and hit a clean jumper to send it to a second OT and got the game-clinching rebound there. He finished that one with 27/9, 15 points in the final minute and overtimes. Against Slovenia, Markkanen turned the ball over twice in the final 15 seconds, but he still finished with 24/7 on 13 shots and was +19 in the loss.

There was plenty of both sides on Markkanen. In his first knockout game against Italy, his first outside the support of his home crowd, Markkanen was invisible with a disappointing four points and three boards in 21 minutes. In that game and other times, he continued to get out-physicaled on both ends of the court and looked totally out of his league at times.

But that’s probably okay for a guy that’s 20 years old and has yet to step foot in the NBA. The negatives have plenty of time to be worked on, but the positives really stood out. Markkanen is a very confident shooter and should be, with a pretty shot he can get off any time and one that looks true every shot. He’s confident dribbling the ball and can create space to get his jumper off or take it to the rim with a decent finish.

Markkanen’s shot and array of offensive moves are pretty unprecedented at his age, and few in the NBA can offer his size and skill set at any age. He seems to always go left, and he sets some truly terrible screens, so there’s plenty to work on as his game and body mature. But he played solid defense using verticality well, an improvement over what we saw at Arizona, and he offers so much upside on offense that he probably has a high floor outcome as an NBA prospect. He may or may not become a superstar worth his merit in a Jimmy Butler trade, but it looks like Markkanen will give Chicago Bulls fans plenty to cheer about the next few years nonetheless.

Bogdan Bogdanovic, Serbia

I always develop a few summer crushes at NBA Summer League, and Bogdan Squared was definitely my EuroBasket crush. He’s a 25-year-old wing that just signed a three-year $36-million contract with the Sacramento Kings where he’ll be a rookie, not to be confused with Croatian Bojan Bogdanovic, who played for the Nets and Wizards last year.

Bogdan looks like an NBA athlete physically with a toned body and a long 8'9 reach that gives him a lot of potential defensively. He was the clear leader of an overachieving Serbian team that almost won the whole thing despite missing its two best players (Jokic and Teodosic) and half of its Olympic roster. Bogdanovic has a high IQ and natural feel for the game, and he plays the game with immense confidence and composure and was at his best down the stretch in close games. He scored 18 second-half points to beat Russia, then dominated them a second time in knockout play, and he scored 10 straight 4th-quarter points and made the game-saving steal against Turkey in a de facto road game, cool and collected the whole while.

Bogdanovic averaged five assists per game from the wing and consistently scored around 20 points every game within the flow of the offense. He was smooth in the pick-and-roll and looks like an able secondary handler. He has a confident dribble and keeps his eyes up, and he does well to get into space and is comfortable in the post. There’s a lot of versatility here for a player that can probably play one to three on both ends of the court. There’s a reason he’s one of two players ever to be named EuroLeague Rising Star two times.

Bogdanovic’s shot was inconsistent, and that’s unfortunate for a player that looks like an elite 3-and-D prospect. He shot 29% from the arc on eight threes a game, though his shot looks good and some of those were forced, so there’s reason to believe he’ll shoot better in the flow of an offense where he doesn’t need to be the star. He shot 43% from downtown for Fenerbahçe last year and is a career 38% shooter. Bogdanovic shut down players like Marco Bellinelli and Hungary’s Adam Hanga. His 7-foot wingspan and good lateral movement make him a strong defender. He looks like a player almost any NBA team could use. Let’s hope a real one trades for him soon.

Cedi Osman, Turkey

Osman is a 22-year-old wing who could play real minutes for the Cavs this year. He was the star of the Turkish team and looks like a useful player. Osman was the heart of the team and has real playmaking ability. He has a long wingspan but a light frame, and his dribble is a bit loose. Osman looked most useful as a wing defender. He has quick hands and routine chase-down blocks, a play he’s known for. He was terrific defensively against players like Bogdan Bogdanovic.

On offense, Osman came and went a bit. His best game was 28/7/4 on 14 shots against Russia with 15 free throws drawn, but his shot was hit or miss and looks a bit awkward and forced at times. There’s definite talent here, and that’s something Cleveland badly needs on the wing. We’ll see if his offense gets far enough this year for him to see real time while LeBron is still around.

Dragan Bender, Croatia

Bender is the only player in this section that actually has NBA experience, but he barely saw the floor despite being taken 4th overall by the Suns. Bender was frustrating as a rookie, and it was more of the same at EuroBasket.

At times, you see flashes of what made Bender a top-five pick. He’s an outstanding passer, especially for a 19-year-old big, and he has a high basketball IQ and reads the game well. Bender has a natural three-point shot and catches the ball ready to shoot with a quick release, though several times he used his height and IQ to pivot to a touch pass to find a cutter. And he showed up defensively, with the second highest block rate at Euros, especially good as a help defender. When Bender was engaged and made plays, there were moments that made him look like a potential Porzingis.

The problem was how rare it was to see Bender engaged and involved. Too often, he seemed to just hang out in the corner like a 3-and-D wing, waiting for a pass that never came. Bender would sometimes float around the perimeter looking disengaged, and a couple times he’d suddenly snap to attention and sprint to the corner, almost like that was a clear instruction he was given for spacing. The passing IQ is there but the game understanding still appears to be a year or two away. There were moments, but mostly Bender was uninvolved and often on the bench in the biggest spots. He’s not ready yet.

Five NBA Veterans We Learned More About

Goran Dragic, Slovenia

Dragic was the star at his final international tournament and went out as a deserving MVP and champion. He was fantastic, the best player on the court of every game he played. Dragic controlled the game and looked like a guy that could flip the switch and take over a game at a moment’s notice. He could get to any spot on the court and looked like Steve Nash, keeping his dribble alive as he drove patiently through the lane, waiting for an option to open up.

Dragic could iso and score on just about anyone, and he was unstoppable in transition where Slovenia really killed opponents. Dragic finished with an exclamation point, a tournament-high 35 points in the final including 26 in the first half to set the tone. He was awesome, and it was a joy to watch a guy that’s often overlooked dominate and win. That Dragic is probably not even a top ten point guard in today’s NBA is no fault of his game but just a testament to how deep the position is and how lucky we are to watch them all play night after night. Dragic was awesome.

Kristaps Porzingis, Latvia

Latvia was probably the most fun other than Serbia, and Porzingis was a huge part of that. There were moments when Porzingis completely took over the game. In the first two and a half minutes against Great Britain, Porzingis set the tone with three dunks and a three to put the game away before it even got started. Against Serbia, there was a 75-second window where Porzingis blocked a shot, forced a miss, hit a three, came back for a highlight block on defense, then finished the whole thing off by catching the ball at the arc, giving a head fake, and finishing with a dribble drive dunk. That 75 seconds was the whole Kristaps package, the sort of thing that makes you drool over his limitless potential. There’s truly never been another talent that could make that sequence of plays — that’s Porzingis the Unicorn.

Porzingis averaged 24 points a game on 53% shooting with 5.9 rebounds per game, and he led Euros with 1.9 blocks per game. His shot is crisp and pure, and he played with immense confidence. That three is dirty and is a shot KP can get off whenever he wants it, and it looks good every time, and Porzingis towered over most of his opponents with his lanky 7'3 frame. He had a handful of his signature tip dunks and was one of the stars of the tournament. At times he looked like DeAndre Jordan with a three pointer. What even is that?

But the other times in between some concern. Porzingis is as skinny as he is tall and often got out-physicaled on the boards and in defense. He had no shot against guys like Mozgov and Boban, giving up position and getting dominated in the post. He’s young and his body will fill out, but how much can he really add? His value as a center is lost if he can’t guard them on the other end. That 5.9 rebounds per game is actually disappointing for the tallest guy on the court. Porzingis floats around the perimeter a lot on offense looking for his shot, and that wastes a lot of potential value he could have as an offensive rebounder or on tips. He doesn’t set physical or particularly useful screens. Many times I saw him floating around the edge of the perimeter with his hands ready to catch and shoot and had to wonder, is this guy a unicorn or taller Tayshaun Prince?

KP’s lack of bulk also saw him get into foul trouble at times. In Latvia’s final game against Slovenia, Porzingis was dominant with 34 points but picked up cheap fouls that limited his playing time. He dominated near the basket shooting 11/14 but made only one of seven threes, and he fouled out and missed the game’s conclusion. He also got dominated by Mozgov against Russia and fouled out in 24 minutes. That’s a bit troubling.

There’s a lot to love about Porzingis, but the concerns are real too. It’s helpful to remember at this point that KP just turned 22, that no one in the world can do what he does, and that he’ll only get smarter, stronger, and better for another half a decade. We need to see how physical Porzingis can get. Can he actually be a useful center defensively, and is he going to play like one on offense and use that height to his advantage? If not, I wonder if Porzingis is more of a super tall wing that can make highlight plays and change the game but might end up being an elite third player on a great team. If he wants to be a superstar and lead a team, he may need to change his style of play as his body fills out. The talent and star power is most certainly there, and the ceiling truly is the roof. We’ll see if he gets there.

Dennis Schröder, Germany

Schröder was one of the stars at EuroBasket, the tournament’s second leading scorer with 23.7 points on 48% shooting plus 5.6 assists per game, and he led Germany to an upset win over France in the round of 16. Schröder got to the rim any time he wanted and stood out athletically. On the surface, he really stood out.

But did Schröder really show anything we hadn’t seen? We already knew he has a quick dribble and can beat less athletic defenders to the basket, so that was no real surprise, and he still can’t actually finish at the rim once he gets there. Schröder was brilliant his first game with 32/5/7 and five threes, but he didn’t shoot many threes after that and instead began to pile up the turnovers. Schröder averaged a tourney-worst 4.7 turnovers per game and had games of six, seven, and nine TOs, and he had some very poor shooting games too. He was very good on defense at times, but again, we already know he can use his athleticism there.

Did Schröder really show anything we haven’t already seen? Not really. The same wiggle and quickness has always been there, but there’s no significant growth for a guy that just turned 24. Is Schröder a real starting point guard or just a dead-end prospect? In the end, that might just be Schröder’s cat.

Dario Saric, Croatia

Saric was terrific for Croatia at the Olympics, but he disappointed at Euros. His numbers looked fine at 15 points and 7 boards a game, but he shot just 39% and had an inefficient tournament. Saric’s biggest strengths are rebounding and passing. He was consistently strong on the boards and has a nice vision as a big man passer. But he showed shockingly poor game awareness at times.

Saric had two shot clock violations in a two-minute span of a close 4th quarter, and he had repeated possessions where he got the ball and seemed to decide it was his possession, forcing up an ugly inefficient shot. Saric played out of control at times and needed a lot of shots (and turnovers and fouls) to compile decent counting stats. He was far better as part of the offense than as the focal point, and that undercuts a lot of the late season production we saw in Philadelphia when Saric made his push for Rookie of the Year. A late 25-game stretch saw Saric average 19/8/3 but with 45% shooting on 16 shots a game. Now that Philly’s stars are healthy, they’ll need Saric to fit into an offensive role. If he wants to be the star instead, he may have to do so with a bench unit.

Bojan Bogdanovic, Croatia

This is the Bogdanovic the Wizards traded for midseason, before he left in the summer to sign with the Pacers. Bojan was the clear leader and best player for Croatia, no small feat for a team featuring top-five pick Dragan Bender and Rookie of the Year runner-up Dario Saric (though that may say more about those two than him). Bogdanovic is a 28-year-old wing that looks like that weirdly unguardable 50-year-old in your church league that sweats through like four jerseys a game.

Bojan is big but not super athletic and he’s a scorer, the sort of guy made to look good as the central scorer in a tournament like this. He has a pure shot and can score in bunches, and he finished top five in scoring with a scorching 55% three pointer. Bogdanovic dominated the ball and played a ton of iso, getting off a heap of shots, though he was efficient and accurate too. He moves well off the ball but plays a little too much iso, and he was much better when he got a slower big guy on him and could dribble past. Bogdanovic offers nothing on defense and sometimes gave up as many points on one end as he scored on the other. He looks like he could be useful as the central scorer of a bench unit, which is mostly what we already knew.

A Few Other Notes on Everyone Else

Czech Republic

Tomas Satoransky is a 25-year-old point guard that plays for the Wizards, and watching him play made it clear why the Wizards continue to search for a useful backup. He’s lanky and uses his length well but has a poor basketball IQ. Satoransky looked like a point guard that never knew what decision he was about to make until he was making it. He threw big looping cross-court passes and racked up turnovers with poor shooting. Honestly, I’d never have guessed Satoransky was an NBA player from anything I saw this summer.

France

Evan Fournier was the team’s leader and took over in crunch time. He showed a nice shot and good movement off the ball but mostly looked like a useful scorer. Boris Diaw didn’t look particularly interested to be there. The passing gene is still there and he hit a few threes, but he was totally unwilling to move on defense and hurt the team. Joffrey Laveurgne looked like the worst player on the court at times but used his size well in other games. When he was the biggest guy out there, he dominated with size and a soft touch near the rim. In other games he missed a ton of bunnies and looked lost on defense. He may be Greg Popovich’s biggest reclamation project yet.

Georgia

Zaza Pachulia was as expected. He typically flirted with a double-double and used his size to dominate on the boards, but he’s so clumsy and awkward and can’t really dribble at all. You just cringe seeing the ball in Zaza’s hands. Tornike Shengelia never clicked in limited NBA minutes but is 25 and looked useful. He’s a decent athlete and uses his size and athleticism well, and he was a go-to scorer for Georgia. He scored 29 in an upset win over Lithuania and had a monster 25/19/4 game against Omri Casspi and Israel. Michael Dixon is a 26-year-old point guard from Memphis. He is a good defender and had a couple of big offensive games. It wouldn’t be a shock to see Shengelia or Dixon make their way back to the NBA at some point.

Germany

Daniel Theis is a useful looking combo forward. He’s 6'9 and 25 years old and has shot 40% from downtown in limited attempts. His biggest value is on defense, so that should fit well on the Celtics. He defends well in the pick-and-roll and in space and got hot a couple times with a 15/15 game and 22/6 in a surprise win against France. Another wing for Boston. Isaiah Hartenstein was a second round pick for Houston this year, and he looks a long ways away. He played mostly garbage time, if anything, and did very little. He doesn’t look ready physically or mentally.

Greece

Georgios Papagiannis averaged 3.9 blocks per 40 minutes but also a brutal 8.3 fouls. He played only a few minutes a game and would’ve fouled out if he played more. Kostas Papanikolaou also got in a ton of foul trouble, fouling out of his first three games, and making little impact when he was out there.

Thanasis Antetokoounmpo plays with high energy and is bouncy but raw, ready to make the highlight play but not always super aware, a problem at age 25. The body is there but the polish and know-how is missing, and he didn’t play much as the tournament went along. Nick Calathes is a Euro star and played well, doing a bit of everything at point guard. He’s 28 so his NBA window has probably passed, and it seems he prefers it that way.

Hungary

Hungary’s best player by an embarrassing margin was Adam Hanga, a 28-year-old wing with good vision and playmaking ability. His shot has a hitch but he can make some plays and rebound, and he’s the best wing defender in Europe. He had a monster 31/8/8 game against Czech. He probably won’t end up in the NBA, but naturally the Spurs own his rights if he does.

Israel

Israel was one of the biggest disappointments, failing to advance out of a group they hosted. Omri Casspi had a couple moments against Georgia, with a driving layup to tie the game and a game-saving block against Zaza Pachulia to save it, but otherwise he didn’t stand out much. He did consistently score 15 or 20 points mostly in the flow of the game, so perhaps he’ll be a useful rotation player for the Warriors.

Italy

Marco Bellinelli was what you’d expect, a volume scorer who was given the green light to shoot away as Italy’s best player. He’s wily and creative and a good creator, but he missed a lot of shots. Luigi Datome has a very European game. He has a janky, slithery dribble and a game that doesn’t always look right but gets the job done. He never found much of an NBA home but has been a star in Europe. Nicolo Melli was undrafted but looks like a potentially useful 26-year-old stretch big with a nice shot.

Latvia

Porzingis was the star but there were a lot of fun Latvian players around him. San Antonio’s Davis Bertans was there, though older brother Dairis Bertans played just as much. Davis can certainly shoot and he’s a fluid athlete that can put the ball on the floor and drive. He hit seven threes in one game and six in another, but he was poor on defense and looks mostly like a stretch shooter.

Janis Timma is a 25-year-old wing that showed out with a few big games. Like apparently everyone in Latvia, he has a very nice shot and put up some big lines with 27 against Belgium and 21/5/6 against Montenegro. The Magic own his rights, and he looks like a combo forward they could play out of position in the tradition of Aaron Gordon and Jonathan Isaac. Sigh. Rolands Smits didn’t play much, another combo forward, but at age 22 he looks like a rising star that could find his way stateside soon enough.

Lithuania

Jonas Valanciunas probably would’ve made a few All Star Games in the 90s but he’s a dollar short and two decades late now. He’s an excellent rebounder, leading EuroBasket with 12rpg, and he had four double-doubles in six games and was dominant on the offensive glass. It feels like Valanciunas has to be force fed in the post to have any real value, and nothing he does on offense fits into the flow of the game. At times he’d dominate JV competition (heh) with 22/14 against Ukraine and 27/15 versus Germany, but other times he failed to take over and didn’t stand out enough. He’s great at what he does, but what he does is outdated.

Donatas Motiejunas has a decent little hook shot but didn’t play much and looks like he may have missed his shot. Mindaugas Kuzminskas is a shooter. He has almost a set shot with very little lift but his height and high release make it work. He can be a bench scorer for the Knicks. Vlade Divac traded for Arturas Gudaitis but it’s unclear why. He barely saw the floor and looks like another behemoth oaf at center, so at least he’ll fit in with the Kings.

Montenegro

Nikola Vucevic looked like many of the other bigs at EuroBasket in that he was decent and usually finished with around a double-double but didn’t stand out or dominate. He has a soft touch and is comfortable in the post and he’s a great rebounder but he is very poor on pick-and-roll defense and had absolutely no shot against the Gasols or Porzingis on defense.

Russia

Timofey Mozgov looked healthy. He looked like he belonged out there with the other Euro bigs, which is good in his case. He played tough defense and dominated in the post against players like Boban and Porzingis. Alexey Shved led all players in scoring at 24.3 and made First Team All Euros but shot a miserable 42%. He’s tricksy with the ball in his hands and does a nice job keeping his dribble alive and creating something, but he is not meant to be such a volume scorer and had a lot of misses and turnovers. He’s a fun player to watch but at age 28, the NBA window is probably gone.

Serbia

The biggest takeaway from Serbia was how good they were even missing Jokic, Teodosic, and five other players from their Olympic team, making it all the way to the title game. They were led by Bogdan Bogdanovic, but it was nice to see Boban Marjanovic. He is a giant, even against the other Euro bigs. He’s got surprisingly soft hands and is a comfortable passer with nimble feet and a nice touch pass, and he can finish around the rim. But he’s really slow laterally and has no chance anywhere more than three feet from the hoop, so he doesn’t get to rebounds and gets played off the court defensively. We’ll always have those absurd garbage time numbers for the Spurs and that dude that tried to argue Boban was as good as Karl-Anthony Towns.

Slovenia

It was a ton of fun watching Anthony Randolph, who is apparently both Slovenian and still somehow only 28 years old. For about the billionth time in his life Randolph flashed tantalizing potential, and he actually played with pretty good consistency for the most part. He played really good on-ball defense against Markkanen and Porzingis and stretched defenses with a nice three, a weapon that really undid Spain in the semifinals.

Randolph got into it with opponents and got Porzingis in foul trouble, eventually fouling him out and literally threatening to take things outside after the game. He was a joy to watch and maybe there’s still an NBA future for a guy that looks like exactly the type of stretch big every team covets in 2017. Vlatko Cancar was a second round pick for the Nuggets this year. He didn’t post many numbers but flashed some potential for a 20-year-old.

Spain

Spain crushed the competition in most of their games. They won by so much and played such a deep roster that it was actually difficult to take away much from their players. Pau and Marc Gasol looked healthy and spry. Pau posted some disgusting stat lines in limited minutes but shot 6/15 and looked slow and out of place in Spain’s semifinal loss to Slovenia, consistently failing to cover on defense.

Ricky Rubio looks like Jon Snow now but that didn’t stop opponents from ignoring him as a shooter. He shot with more confidence and had some big moments but also struggled against players like Schröder and Dragic, shooting 6-for-20 in those games. Sergio Rodriguez was the better point guard. He’s a showtime playmaker out there and averaged 12 assists per 40 minutes with an awesome 3.4 assist-to-turnover ratio, and he was the guy with the ball in his hands for Spain in close games.

Juancho and Willy Hernangomez put up good numbers, but mostly in garbage time. Willy is athletic and was devastating rolling to the hoop on pick-and-rolls, and his 17 rebounds per 40 led all players, but he didn’t get key minutes. Juancho played a bit too aggressively and not in the flow of the offense, with plenty of bad shots, turnovers, and charges. He’s athletic and can stretch the offense as a three while playing the four on defense. His game is lacking polish right now, but the upside is there. Alex Abrines barely played for a team that badly needed wings and gave a ton of minutes to a 33-year-old dude named Fernando San Emeterio, so that’s a bit concerning.

Turkey

Furkan Korkmaz was the 26th pick in last year’s draft and will suit up for the 76ers this year. He’s is a 20-year-old wing with good size and a smooth shot with a high release. His jumper looks good, but I didn’t see much else there, and Korkmaz picked up some key turnovers when he tried to make plays with the ball in his hands. We’ll see if he can become more than a shooter.

Semih Erden’s NBA chances are done at age 31, but you no player was more important to his team’s success. He’s a big man that was consistently the team’s best on/off guy and dominated Marc Gasol at one point. He got into foul trouble, and Turkey lost quickly when he went out. Melih Mahmutoglu was a lot of fun. He’s a 27-year-old shooting guard that can score in bunches, and he put up points in a hurry with five threes in one game and seven in another. He’s a real player but will probably stay in Turkey where he’s a star for EuroLeague champion Fenerbahçe.

Closing Thoughts

EuroBasket 2017 was a ton of fun, and I’m glad I watched. Almost every team played an open, entertaining style of basketball, and the talent and competition level was high. The NBA could learn a lot from some of the rules that made EuroBasket more fun.

No timeouts from open play made for more interesting endings and games that finished under two hours almost every time, and the final two minutes actually took two or three minutes instead of a half hour. Let the players make plays. Fouls must be real fouls too — make a play on the ball or it’s an intentional foul. That also helped end-of-game play and kept the flow moving. I’m going to miss that in a month when it’s Hack-a-DJ with four minutes left in a Clippers game that finishes at 1:15am.

Perhaps the NBA should consider adopting the rule that allows the ball to be knocked off the rim on shots. That might bring back some of the value for big men, and it would make rebounding more interesting. They should definitely adopt the rule where the shot clock rests to 14 seconds on an offensive rebound instead of 24. There’s no need to pass the ball back out and run 10 seconds off the clock. A quicker reset forced teams to regroup quickly and get into a new action. All of these rule differences made the Euro game more interesting and pleasing to watch.

The one key thing lacking at EuroBasket was the elite athleticism we’ll find in any NBA game, but it actually wasn’t missed that much. Highlight dunks and blocks are sweet, but so are good strategy, sweet shooting, and high IQ basketball. Fans and arenas could learn a lot too. Turn off the music and let the fans go nuts. Teams playing at home had a real, significant home court advantage and it made the games so much more fun.

EuroBasket 2017 was a blast. I had fun watching and writing about it, and I hope you enjoyed it too. Thanks for reading!

If you enjoyed this piece, give it a few claps 👏 👏 so others see it too! Follow Brandon on Medium or @wheatonbrando for more sports and humor. Visit the rest of Brandon’s writing archives here.