How Point Guard Prospects Played in Their FIBA Champions League Debuts

Nolan Traore, Mario Saint-Supery, and Neoklis Avdalas made their FIBA Champions League debuts and found varying degrees of success. Traore unsurprisingly looked the strongest, but Saint-Supery reminded folks of his previous dominance at youth tournaments.

FIBA.com

The FIBA Champions League, a second-tier continental competition in European basketball, has its season underway and that means we recently got debuts for three point guard/point-forward prospects in opening games: Nolan Traore, Mario Saint-Supery, and Neoklis Avdalas. All three prospects are draft-eligible in 2025, but only Traore is expected to enter the draft at this time with Saint-Supery and Avdalas likely remaining patient.

Let's take a look at how they performed in their debut games shows why. 

Read More: Neoklis Avdalas Prospect Breakdown

Traore and Saint-Quentin opened their season against Greek side Kolossos and were in total control from start to finish. He ended up with a monster stat line of 28 points on 9-of-18 shooting from the field and 4-of-10 from beyond the arc and added five assists without turning the ball over once. This was the performance scouts and analysts have been waiting to see from Traore, who is in the top five of nearly all draft boards. 

Now, they’ll want to see this transfer over to domestic league play in France. Traore has struggled in the first two games of the domestic season against AS Monaco and Le Mans. He’s averaging six points and 1.5 rebounds per game while boasting a negative assists-to-turnover ratio on 20/17/63 shooting splits. It’s only two games, and Traore is expected to blossom out of this rut so hopefully this strong showing in continental play helps him do that. 

Spanish point guard Saint-Supery hasn’t been discussed in any major way in regards to the NBA Draft as he’s not expected to be a 2025 entrant but his dominant play at youth tournaments has kept his name towards the top of international prospect discussions. In Manresa’s BCL opener against Portuguese side SL Benfica Saint-Supery reminded everyone what he’s capable of, dropping 13 points on 4-of-6 shooting and adding six assists without making a turnover. 

Spanish basketball is desperate for quality guard play. The generation of Jose Calderon, Ricky Rubio, Sergio Rodriguez, and Sergio Llull is officially over and naturalized Lorenzo Brown and Barcelona guard Dario Brizuela are their current options. They’ll be hoping Juan Nunez and Saint-Supery are able to develop into guards that can compete with what they’re expected to see from countries like France and Team USA for the battles to come on the international stage. 

Avdalas, who we took a look at earlier this week, had a minimal impact against FMP Beograd finishing with five points on 2-of-6 shooting, one assist, and one rebound. So far, the Greek point forward has looked better in domestic play. Reliably knocking down the three-point shot will be make or break for Avdalas as a prospect, whether he enters the 2025 NBA Draft or does so down the road. He did shoot 28 percent on over 30 attempts at the U18 Euro’s this past summer, which was the best his three has ever looked on any sample around that size. Avdalas’ size and skill make him intriguing, but we know how quickly prospects like him can go south when they don’t have a reliable jump shot.

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