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Awards Watch: EuroLeague Top Scorer
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. We start with their selections for the Alphonso Ford EuroLeague Top Scorer Trophy.
Mike James has it in the bag
by Geoff Gillingham
Having entered the 2023-24 campaign knowing that becoming the EuroLeague’s all-time top scorer is a real possibility, AS Monaco star Mike James has been on a tear all season long. James has led the EuroLeague in scoring over the last couple of months – and currently averages a league-best 19.4 points per night – and I am convinced that he will come away with his second Alphonso Ford EuroLeague Top Scorer Trophy come the end of the campaign.
What’s more, James is now just 28 points behind Greek legend Vassilis Spanoulis for the all-time top scorer honor and should usurp his friend “Billy” in the next game or two. There’s no doubt that James’s scoring makes Monaco a huge threat on a night in, night out basis, and I don’t think that “The Natural” will be slowing down any time soon. This might not be the only individual award that James wins this season, too…
You can bet on more Markus Howard heroics
by Frankie Sachs
Baskonia Vitoria-Gasteiz sharpshooter Markus Howard is second in the league in scoring with 19.2 points per game, which is 0.2 points less than the leader, Mike James. In total, he trails James for the top spot by just 5 points. Anyone who has seen Howard get hot this season knows that he can tally 5 points in a matter of seconds. No player has more 30-point games this season than Howard’s three. His 35-point outburst against LDLC ASVEL Villeurbanne in Round 9 remains the second-most points scored by a player this season and his 33 at AS Monaco in Round 20 is tied for third.
Howard also has five games with at least 6 triples made; no other player has more than two. Just two weeks ago, he set a club record with an 18-point second-quarter in Round 25 against Maccabi Playtika Tel Aviv. Howard started the season in a bit of a rut; he averaged 6.3 points on 2-for-19 three-point shooting (10.5) over his first three games. Ever since, Howard has been worth 20.7 points on 43.5% three-point shooting. Those numbers should lead him to the scoring title.
Watch out for Wade Baldwin
by Igor Petrinovic
Currently sitting in fourth place among EuroLeague top scorers is All-EuroLeague guard Wade Baldwin of Maccabi Playtika Tel Aviv. He is averaging 17.4 points, having appeared in 19 games this season. However, Baldwin is currently the hottest scorer in the competition. Over the last five games no player has scored more than Baldwin's 23.8 points per game, and that is a full 5 points per game more than Mike James over that same five-game stretch since Round 22.
The lead held by James and Howard at the top of the scoring charts might at first look out of reach for Baldwin, but bear in mind that if Baldwin and James continue scoring at the same rate as they have been the last five games, Baldwin would overtake James as the top scorer at the end of Round 34. I think that is more than possible, and that is not the slightest of knocks on James’s and Howard’s scoring abilities. I really believe Baldwin can do it.
Don't count Shane Larkin out
by Javier Gancedo
He may be a few points behind, but it is isn't over until it's over. Shane Larkin of Anadolu Efes Istanbul ranks third in scoring (17.6 ppg.) this season. With the same number of games, Larkin is 46 points behind James, but there are good reasons to believe he will catch up and challenge for the scoring title. Larkin has been Efes's go-to guy and leader all season, but even more so since Tomislav Mijatovic was promoted to head coach.
In those two games with Coach Mijatovic, he already boosted his scoring average to 20.5 points. Larkin is arguably in his best shape since averaging 22.2 points in the 2019-20 season. That's when he broke the EuroLeague's single-game scoring record, getting 49 points against FC Bayern Munich. Larkin is full of confidence and on a mission to keep Efes in the playoff race, so expect him to fight for the Alphonso Ford Trophy, too.