It was another good night for Azoulas Tubelis as Zalgiris Kaunas crushed Crvena Zvezda in Euroleague. Emmet Ryan on how the young forward is showing exceptional promise and awareness.
It’s rather odd that Azuolas Tubelis is even in this situation at this time, for a few reasons. Still, he once again put in an efficient shift where his off ball work proved more than useful for Zalgiris Kaunas.
Granted, Friday’s win over Crvena Zvezda got one-sided early. Still, Tubelis has quickly shown in his debut Euroleague season that he more than belongs at this level.
This is normal
Tubelis didn’t light up the box score to quite the extent that he did against Virtus Bologna on Wednesday but he didn’t need to. Tubelis logged 17 points on 6 of 11 shooting including 3 of 5 from deep. Throw on 5 rebounds, an assist, and a steal and it trended slightly above his season averages.
Since joining Zalgiris, Tubelis has been tremendously reliable in Euroleague. His average of 11 points, 5.1 rebounds, and 0.8 assists per game in just over 21 minutes per game doesn’t exactly make your eyes pop. It’s his reliable efficiency and ability to slot into the job given him that has made Tubelis stand out.
As we saw in EuroBasket, Tubelis is a man who knows how to get an assignment. The more he gets it, the more involved he becomes on the whole. It’s his off ball movement that really adds to things, reducing space for opponents while on D and creating more of it for his side offensively. It’s a classic case of simple not easy.
Yet his signing spurred controversy
Many of the hardcore fans of Zalgiris weren’t exactly wild about his signing. Tubelis, from Vilnius and developed with Rytas, apparently said some immature stuff about the Kaunas club while he was a teenager. Oh how grateful I am that we didn’t have internet access, let alone social media, when I was living through those years.
In truth the complaints about Tubelis were part of a wider series of gripes held by many Zalgiris supporters. Most of these had far more merit related to the direction the club is going in terms of culture vs commercialisation and the price of tickets. The Tubelis signing was caught up in the mess as a guy who hadn’t shown respect for said culture was now being signed.
The forward appears to have decided to give his answers on the court. With a reliable and workhorse approach, it’s rather difficult to stay mad at a guy for what he said when he was a teenager. At least it ought to be.
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Of course there was the whole other option
Tubelis is a name that will be familiar to some of our US readers. A consensus second team All-American at Arizona, he impressed mightily in the NCAA system before going undrafted after his junior year.
The Philadelphia 76ers had him on their summer league roster and kept him for training camp but waived him before the NBA season proper started. Rather than taking a two-way, Tubelis returned to Lithuania. He immediately went and won the LKL MVP award with Neptunas, while on loan from Rytas.
Then he had another fine season, this time with Rytas, before his breakout performances at EuroBasket. The move to Zalgiris represented a step up but one he has proven more than capable of embracing. At 23, he’s already hit the level of a guy you can plug in at Euroleague level for a decade and not worry about him. Higher callings may await, largely because of his role awareness.
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Critical to the near future
Tubelis not being a star but being able to deliver is the type of player that is vital to Zalgiris. The Kaunas club will never have the money of the bigger clubs in Euroleague. When it spends, it does so strategically. Nigel Williams Goss, Moses Wright, and Sylvain Francisco are on the star money because they’re in the places on the floor where Zalgiris needs stars.
The rest of the roster is a touch Moneyball, with Tubelis fitting the bill of likely being undervalued due to his relatively mild exposure in Europe up to now. His appearances in last season’s Basketball Champions League were his first in pan-European competition.
With the win over Crvena Zvezda on Friday night, Zalgiris moved to 8th place with a 12-9 record. The race for the playoffs (top six) is very much in play for them but they also need to be mindful of the chasing pack to remain in the play-ins (6th to 10th). Having someone that is excellent at making the game simple, like Tubelis, will be critical to the run-in.
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