An epic performance on a record-breaking night saw FC Barcelona’s Kevin Punter post a PIR of 40, snatching MVP of the Round honors for the first time since joining the club and the fourth time in his career.
On a night when Barcelona set a new EuroLeague scoring record in a 134-124 triple-overtime win over Kosner Baskonia Vitoria-Gasteiz, Punter netted 43 points, becoming just the ninth player this century to score more than 40 points in a EuroLeague game. Logging 44 minutes and 59 seconds, he set a club record by making 12 two-point field goals on 19 attempts. He also went 4-of-7 from three-point range and a perfect 7-of-7 from the free-throw line, while adding 2 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 steals.
Two players finished Round 17 with a PIR of 35: Baskonia’s Markus Howard and Dubai Basketball’s McKinley Wright. Howard shined with 33 points on 6-of-8 shooting from two-point range and 6-of-7 from beyond the arc, along with 6 assists, in Baskonia’s loss to Barcelona. Wright, meanwhile, recorded 17 points, 15 assists, 4 rebounds and 2 steals in Dubai’s come-from-behind 76-80 road win over Anadolu Efes Istanbul.
The next-best PIR of the round, 32, belonged to Barcelona’s Tomas Satoransky, who finished the triple-overtime thriller with 23 points, 8 rebounds and 6 assists. Rounding out the top performers is Olympiacos Piraeus forward Sasha Vezenkov, who posted a PIR of 28 behind 17 points, 5 rebounds and 4 assists in a 107-84 win over LDLC ASVEL Villeurbanne.
Individual highs: McKinley Wright, Dubai, 15 assists
Punter led all scorers with 43 points in this round. Baskonia’s Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot is the new scoring leader with 20.1 points per game.
Two players had a round-best 11 rebounds: Kenneth Faried of Panathinaikos AKTOR Athens and Dan Oturu of Hapoel IBI Tel Aviv. Nikola Milutinov of Olympiacos remains the league rebounding leader with 7.5 boards per game.
Dubai’s McKinley Wright dished a EuroLeague season-high 15 assists. Wright and Zalgiris guard Sylvain Francisco are the EuroLeague co-leaders in this category, each averaging 6.9 assists per game.
Real Madrid’s Facundo Campazzo led all players in Round 17 with 4 steals. Alpha Diallo of AS Monaco tops the steals charts, averaging 1.7 per game.
Real Madrid’s Walter Tavares had 4 blocks, more than any other player in this round. Tavares improved his season-best average to 2.1 rejections per contest.
There were two double-doubles in Round 17: McKinley Wright with 17 points and 15 assists, and Codi Miller-McIntyre of Crvena Zvezda Meridianbet Belgrade with 21 points and 10 assists.