Curios to know which scorers have been at the top of their game over the past two months? Look no further!
Stats review: The most efficient scorers in 2024
Stats
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The Turkish Airlines EuroLeague returns this week as the final push towards the playoffs begins in earnest. With eight rounds to be played over the next seven weeks, the tension is palpable in the middle of the standings where 13 teams have tallied between 11 and 16 wins, creating a logjam that spans from slots in line for homecourt advantage in the best-of-five playoff series through the Play-In Showdown range, and all the way down to 15th place.
With so much left to determine for so many teams, it's worth noting which players are riding the biggest waves of momentum into the stretch run.
The graphic above looks at the most efficient offensive players in the EuroLeague since the calendar turned to 2024, a range that covers nine rounds. For perspective, Real Madrid currently leads the EuroLeague averaging 1.06 points per possession while Alec Peters of Olympiacos Piraeus has been the season’s top individual scorer averaging 1.32 points per possession.
Real Madrid's 24-year-old swingman Dzanan Musa has had an excellent year overall, but he caught fire in January to help his team build a significant cushion at the top of the standings. Making over 40% of his three-point attempts both off the dribble and in catch-and-shoot situations while converting 64% around the rim, he’s been able to pick opposing defenses apart in pick-and-rolls and impact the game without the ball in his hands.
Knocking down 57% of his catch-and-shoot three-point attempts to more than double his scoring average for Olympiacos from a year ago, Peters has seized his opportunity to shine this season. His shooting prowess is one of the reasons his team has been able to climb towards the top of the logjam in the standings and both he and veteran scoring guard Isaiah Canaan—another returning player who has doubled his scoring average from last season in Piraeus—figure to give the Reds a chance earn one of the coveted spots above the Play-In Showdown if they can stay hot.
Vesely making a difference from mid-range
Amid the highest per-minute scoring season of his long, decorated EuroLeague career, former MVP Jan Vesely has made his return to the top of the efficiency leaderboards, though perhaps not in the manner one might expect. Vesely has shot 71% finishing around the rim in both of his seasons with FC Barcelona, but this year he’s knocked down an impressive 55% of his midrange jump shots as well. Even if he’s not spacing the floor out to the three-point line, there’s value in that for his team as it’s a dramatic improvement on the 36% he shot a year ago and good enough to keep opposing big men honest.
A pair of Zalgiris stars
Laurynas Birutis has picked up EuroLeague experience in spurts over the last six seasons, but the towering Zalgiris Kaunas center has found a real formula this season not just finishing as well as one would expect in close, but making 58% of his hook shots and 72% of floaters to score efficiently even when he does not have an angle to the rim.
It hasn’t hurt Birutis that Keenan Evans has been devastating defenses over the last two months. As the highest-volume player on this list by a comfortable margin, the dynamic guard feels like he is really all the way back from the Achilles’ injury that spoiled his breakout campaign last year. Ranking among the top-two players in both pick-and-roll and isolation scoring efficiency looking like he has not missed a beat, Evans has been particularly unguardable in 2024 which has bolstered his value as a passer as well and keyed Zalgiris’s recent climb towards the middle of the standings.
A good sign for Zvezda
Bonzie Colson, Jonathan Motley, Serge Ibaka, and Rokas Giedraitis have all started the year on a high note as well. Among those four, only Giedraitis’s Crvena Zvezda Meridianbet Belgrade team has fewer than 11 wins. However, with the EuroLeague's seventh-best point differential, they seem overdue for a rise back into the thick of things.
With 10 teams qualifying for the postseason for the first time in modern EuroLeague history, the battle for those additional spots is setting up to be fierce. Time will tell which teams will seize the opportunity and which players carry them there, but the group above has gotten a head start on what may be one of the more dramatic regular season finishes in recent memory.