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Awards Watch: All-EuroLeague First Team
Awards
5 Mins read
With the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague on a two-week hiatus from games, it is the perfect time to look back at the top performers from the first 26 rounds of the regular season and to look ahead and make our early picks for some of the end-of-season awards.
Several Euroleague.net staff members will take part and reveal their choices. After sharing their selections for the Alphonso Ford EuroLeague Top Scorer Trophy on Monday and the EuroLeague Best Defender Trophy on Tuesday, today we look at their choices for the All-EuroLeague First Team.
Facu Campazzo, Mike James, Dzanan Musa, Jan Vesely, Mathias Lessort
by Javier Gancedo
I am going to be practical. I am assuming that the best four teams in the standings will get the home-court advantage in the playoffs and advance to the Final Four, so I am going to pick one star per team plus another from Real as the best team in the competition. Mike James (19.4 ppg., 5.3 apg., 21.6 PIR) has to be there in what should be a historic season for him. Facu Campazzo leads Real Madrid in PIR (16.8) and Dzanan Musa (13.6 ppg., 14.0 PIR) was already chosen to the 2022-23 All-EuroLeague First Team.
Jan Vesely of FC Barcelona ranks second in PIR per 40 minutes (31.5) and is posting great numbers (12.9 ppg., 4.5 rpg., 16.6 PIR) in 21 minutes per night. And Mathias Lessort of Panathinaikos AKTOR Athens, also a first-team choice last season, leads the Greens in rebounds (6.1 rpg.) and PIR (18.6). And I expect these five players to dominate in the playoffs, when fans, coaches, media and players vote!
Mike James, Facu Campazzo, Dinos Mitoglou, Jan Vesely, Mathias Lessort
by Geoff Gillingham
It didn’t take me too long to decide on my five. For starters, Mike James is having an MVP-caliber season in my eyes and is a lock for the All-EuroLeague First Team. In addition to inspiring Monaco to a 16-10 record so far, the third-best mark in the league, James leads the EuroLeague in scoring (19.4 ppg.) and PIR (21.6). He’s been incredible in 2023-24. Joining him in the backcourt is Real Madrid’s Facundo Campazzo, who has a team-high 16.8 PIR for the team with by far the best record, 22-4. His playmaking – he averages 6.5 assists per game – second best in the league – has been key in making Real such a force this year.
I feel really bad for not putting Virtus’s Toko Shengelia on my team, but I’m instead giving love to Panathinaikos AKTOR Athens’s Dinos Mitoglou. In his first year back at OAKA, Mitoglou has made a huge impact in helping bring a sense of optimism back to the Greens’ supporters, posting 12.8 points., a team-best 6.2 rebounds. and a 15.7 PIR, the second-best mark on the team. Anyone who has watched FC Barcelona this season should not be surprised by this next pick: Jan Vesely. The Czech big man has been back to his best, posting team highs in points (12.9 ppg.) and PIR (16.6) for a Barca team that has been in the upper echelons of the standings throughout almost the entire season. Vesely has been impressive all year long.
Last but not least, Mathias Lessort. Both he and Mitoglou have been two of the main keys behind Panathinaikos becoming a giant force in the EuroLeague once again, with the Frenchman averaging 13.3 points., 6.1 boards and a team-best 18.6 PIR, which is the fifth-best mark in the EuroLeague. In the paint, Lessort has been close to unstoppable right from the season’s opening tip.
Mike James, Facu Campazzo, Chima Moneke, Toko Shengelia, Mathias Lessort
by Igor Petrinovic
No controversies here. In the backcourt, I like AS Monaco guard Mike James, the EuroLeague leader in scoring (19.4 ppg.) and PIR (21.6), who is also eighth in assists (5.3 apg.). I pair him with point guard Facu Campazzo, who ranks second in assists (6.5 apg.) and 10th in average PIR (16.8), the highest PIR on league-leading Real Madrid. At center, the best candidate is Panathinaikos AKTOR Athens’s Mathias Lessort, who is an enormous source of energy and has averaged a PIR of 20.9 in 16 wins, and 14.8 in 10 losses.
Forward Tornike Shengelia (18.1 PIR, 14.5 ppg., 5.5 rpg., 3.6 apg.) had a tremendous start of the season and is an all-around driving force for Virtus Segafredo Bologna, the EuroLeague's most pleasant surprise this season. And Baskonia Vitoria-Gasteiz forward Chima Moneke leads the league in rebounding (7.3 rpg.). Despite coming off the bench, he is just outside the top 10 with 14.2 points per game, while ranking third with a PIR of 19.3.
Mike James, Facu Campazzo, Shane Larkin, Jan Vesely, Mathias Lessort
by Frankie Sachs
This is all about projecting the future, isn’t it? We know how the players have performed until now and the key to this exercise is to decide who will keep it up – and even improve – down the stretch. Some of these picks are no-brainers. Not only is Mike James the league leader in scoring and PIR, but Monaco faces the easiest road to the finish line in terms of strength of schedule. No one has done more for the league’s best team this season than Facu Campazzo, who leads Los Blancos in minutes played, games started (25), assists (6.5 apg.), steals (1.2 spg.) and PIR (16.8). Jan Vesely’s place is secured thanks to his outstanding per-minute numbers and what he contributes to the team sitting second in the standings.
There are three players I gave strong consideration to for my remaining two spots: Mathias Lessort, Shane Larkin and Chima Moneke. Efes has the second-most-favorable strength of schedule the rest of the way and if it storms up the standings into the Play-In Showdown and then reaches the playoffs with Larkin, who is currently second in the league in average PIR (20.8) leading the way, how can he not be an All-EuroLeague pick. Baskonia and Panathinaikos both have tough remaining schedules, and the question is how their stars will perform down the stretch. Even though Moneke has the superior numbers, Lessort has been nearly as good and if he leads the Greens to home-court advantage in the playoffs and a Final Four berth, the Frenchman cannot be ignored.