Stats review: Turkish teams rise on the strength of exceptional interior scoring

With Besiktas, Turk Telekom, and Bahcesehir all thriving inside, Turkish clubs are shaping the playoff picture through top tier rim efficiency

Round 14 of the BKT EuroCup featured several important road wins, but Besiktas GAIN Istanbul’s victory over Cosea JL Bourg-en-Bresse on the road to finish the season sweep and pull one game behind them at the top of Group A was particularly notable. In a matchup of this season’s second-best offense and second-best defense, Besiktas’s scoring efficiency won the day, thanks in large part to what it accomplished at the rim.

The visitors scored 45 points at the rim in victory, well above the tremendous 26.1 points per game Bourg had allowed at the rim coming into the contest, with a large portion of that total coming on dribble drives out of pick-and-rolls. Besiktas found an avenue to put consistent pressure on the rim and exploited it consistently to notch a hard-fought 4-point win.

Even against an exceptional defense, that may not be entirely surprising as Besiktas currently leads the EuroCup shooting 71% at the rim — the highest mark this decade if the team can sustain it over the next several weeks. While some of that can be traced to the consistency of Ante Zizic, who has shot 80% inside while ranking among the most prolific individual finishers in the EuroCup this season, there’s a lot of depth to how effective Besiktas has been inside this season.

That is most apparent in how many different areas it has excelled in. While Besiktas has scored more points at the rim through driving ball screens than out of any other action, it has shot a massive 77% on rolls to the rim, 73% in transition, and 69% on cuts. Its well-above-average 61% on put-backs has actually hurt its consistency as the numbers have been bolstered by high percentages on a small volume of isos, hand-offs, and off screens ending at the rim.

Besiktas is not the only EuroCup team scoring at a high level inside, and not even the only one hailing from Turkiye as Turk Telekom Ankara has been very effective in its own right. With Kris Bankston and Kyle Alexander shooting a combined 76% inside, the big men contribute heavily to the team's effectiveness and are the driving force behind their league-best 4.6 dunks per game that would rank among the top marks in recent history behind only Paris Basketball and Virtus Bologna’s championship teams. No team has scored more points on cuts than Turk Telekom and their its threats have a lot to do with that.

Bahcesehir College Istanbul completes the Turkish sweep of the top three spots thanks to a balanced effort rooted on the league’s top interior shot quality. It generates a solid volume of catch-and-score opportunities and its guards do a good job driving to draw help and finding ways to dump the ball to teammates inside.

With only four games remaining, every basket matters for that trio as Bahcesehir looks to hang onto second place in Group A and both Besiktas and Turk Telekom remain in the mix for a bye to the quarterfinals from Group B.