EuroLeague Week 23 Winners and Losers: Nigel Hayes-Davis scores 50 points, Partizan's persistent problems, and more

Through 32 rounds of EuroLeague play, these teams are who they are. While the standings are tight overall, the teams battling for 10th are battling for 10th for a reason — there’s not a lot of upside there. The rest of the teams in the play-in struggle with consistency, except Maccabi Tel Aviv, who seem to have hit their stride to close the season. 

What conclusions can we draw about each team before the season wraps up, and what does that tell us about the playoffs or even next season?

EuroLeague Week 23 Winners and Losers: Nigel Hayes-Davis breaks the EuroLeague single-game scoring record with 50 points versus ALBA Berlin

Nigel Hayes-Davis has been playing much better ever since Sarunas Jasikevicius took charge, but he reached not only a new level for himself in their win over ALBA Berlin but also for EuroLeague, becoming the first player to ever score 50 points in a EuroLeague game. 

Hayes-Davis shot 9/11 from two and 9/16 from three. He wasn’t just letting open spot-up looks fly, but coming off-screens and pulling like he’s Caitlin Clark. We’ve had Hayes-Davis up high on our Big Board all season long not because we thought he was capable of a game like this, but because the skills that allowed him to explode for 50 have been on display since October.  

EuroLeague Week 23 Winners and Losers: Partizan’s problems persist

Partizan are essentially the Lakers and Warriors of EuroLeague this season. They were one win away from the Final Four last season, brought back a good chunk of that core, and many - including the person writing this - felt good about their odds of making another Final Four push for this season. 

That level of play has not materialized. Partizan are currently one game out of the final play-in spot after blowing yet another double-digit lead at home against Olympiacos in Round 32. At this point, Partizan are who they are - a team fighting to get into the play-in who would be lucky to take a game off Real Madrid in the playoffs. Why has this team fallen so far from where they finished last season?

For starters, they have not sufficiently replaced the key departures of Dante Exum and Mathias Lessort. P.J. Dozier might be able to reach Exum’s level, but his game management is lacking. He doesn’t guarantee his team buckets or stops when they need them amid opponents gaining momentum like Exum did. Partizan made two turnovers out of timeouts in the fourth quarter against Olympiacos. That’s unacceptable against any team, but Olympiacos will certainly punish you for big mistakes like that. Dozier is 27 and a EuroLeague rookie. He could fill Exum’s shoes down the road but not right now. 

Frank Kaminsky and Bruno Caboclo were brought in for Lessort and they are good, but not Lessort. They are simply not the pick-and-roll animal Lessort is. Lessort’s threat in basketball’s staple two-man game opened up the floor for Partizan’s ancillary players to be fully optimized last season. Cabolco and Kaminsky don’t have the same draw. They can emulate some of what Lessort did - they crash the offensive glass, Kaminsky has had good low post moments - and even space the floor which Lessort didn’t offer. But the pick-and-roll threat isn’t what it used to be, and it makes everyone else easier to guard. 

Partizan has never figured out who their fifth man on the floor should be either. No matter what lineups they put out there this season, there’s almost always a player on the court who is at best ineffective and at worst a drag on the offense. Uros Trifunovic, Danilo Andjusic, Mateusz Ponitka, and Balsa Koprivica have not been EuroLeague-level players this season. 

Lastly, the window seems to have passed on Partizan being able to turn things around. They should shorten their rotation for their final two games and if they qualify, the play-in and playoffs, but there’s no guaranteeing that’s enough. Partizan’s mistakes are rarely met with a solution and are often repetitive. In their loss to Olympiacos last week, they botched their defensive communication on a wing pick-and-roll with Isaiah Canaan in the first quarter and let Olympiacos get an open shot. When the Reds took the lead with just over four minutes to go in the fourth quarter, Kostas Papanikolaou got a wide-open layup from yet another botched communication on a wing pick-and-roll. 

Teams who understand when their backs are against the wall and that every game is a must-win — which is essentially the situation Partizan are in — can focus and cut out mistakes after one occurrence if they’re built to win. This season, that’s not Partizan. 

EuroLeague Week 23 Winners and Losers: Edmond Sumner is figuring it out

In a must-win home game against Milano, who we made the mistake of praising last week, Edmond Sumner stepped up for Zalgiris Kaunas. Sumner finished the game with 17 points and 5 assists on a perfect 6/6 shooting from the field including two threes. It’s taken the former Indiana Pacer and Brooklyn Net some time to adjust to EuroLeague play — the slower pace, crowded paints, and increased emphasis on the 3-point shot — but he’s starting to establish himself. 

Sumner is 28 but still a EuroLeague rookie, and he joined Zalgiris in season. While Sumner is incapable of saving Zalgiris’ season (not that that was the expectation) some quality play for this closing stretch could entice Zalgiris to keep him or other EuroLeague clubs to pursue him in the offseason. EuroLeague is an unforgiving environment. First impressions are not only important but often the be-all and end-all. If you get a chance and don’t capitalize, you may never get another. Sumner has likely played himself into another season, and hopefully, some other EuroLeague rookies this season such as Javonte Smart and Daniel Oturu have done the same. They’ve all seemed capable of contributing at this level but our opinion doesn’t matter, the 18 EuroLeague general managers do.

EuroLeague Week 23 Lines of the Week

Hayes-Davis' 50 points is the winner but a shoutout to Shane Larkin’s 28 points and five threes which gave Anadolu Efes a blowout victory over Baskonia. They are firmly back in the play-in hunt.  

EuroLeague Week 23 Quote of the Week

Jasikevicius’ sense of humor is fantastic. Not sure if any other EuroLeague coach would turn his player's record-breaking scoring performance into a jab about having zero assists.

EuroLeague Week 23 Clip of the Week

Nunn’s game-winner in Bologna.