Shabazz Napier’s Turkish Airlines EuroLeague debut was much-awaited and the veteran guard provided a calming influence - not to mention a strong contribution - in his first game for EA7 Emporio Armani Milan.
The 31-year-old Napier collected 10 points on 3-of-5 shooting and 4-of-4 free throws to go with 2 rebounds and 3 assists in nearly 19 minutes of Milan’s surprising 89-83 win over Cazoo Baskonia Vitoria-Gasteiz.
Napier has been on EuroLeague fans’ radars for some time now. He was originally supposed to debut with Zenit St Petersburg last season. But he was injured in the preseason and never ended up playing after Zenit was expelled from the league due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
It wasn’t clear how much Napier would be able to help against Baskonia, having only arrived in Milan Saturday night and only gone through one practice with the team.
Still, Napier displayed his years of experience - which include two NCAA college championships with the University of Connecticut and playing parts of seven seasons with six teams in the NBA from 2014 to 2020.
Napier played tough defense on Baskonia guard Darius Thompson, who scored 10 points in the first quarter but ended with 19 points. Napier also showed calm in running the offense, dishing a nice feed to Brandon Davies for a dunk. There was also a sign of miscommunication as Napier through away a ball with 93 seconds left - clearly due to a lack of time with his teammates. But Napier made 2 clutch free throws with 30 seconds left and finished the game with a jumper.
"He played a normal first half, but he was concerned with putting his teammates in rhythm and then in the end he also scored an important basket. He gave me the feeling of never being in trouble. He's got a lot of pedigree," Milan head coach Ettore Messina said of his new point guard.
"Now let's see how he goes on Thursday [at home against Crvena Zvezda Meridianbet Belgrade]. He certainly allowed us to rotate the players a little better, to put everyone back in their position a little bit."
And he allowed Milan and its fans to dream that Napier's arrival and Tuesday's win will prove to be a turning point in Milan's season.
