By Antonis Stroggylakis / info@eurohoops.net
The unprecedented cancellation of the 2019-2020 EuroLeague didn’t just bring the season to an early end that no one wanted to see but was ultimately a necessity (hailed as such by the vast majority of the players) amid the coronavirus crisis. It was a conclusion that also abruptly terminated a couple of developing season storylines that could evolve into potentially Oscar-worthy basketball scripts.
Some of these scenarios had the power to grow into legendary material but were ultimately never meant to be. These are five 2019-2020 storylines that were left incomplete without a possibly glorious finale.
Shane Larkin’s MVP opus
There hasn’t been an American MVP in EuroLeague since the back-to-back crowning of Maccabi Tel Aviv great Anthony Parker in 2005 and 2006. A couple of U.S. players came close, performance-wise (Malcolm Delaney’s 2016 run with Lokomotiv Kuban being a notable example) but no one actually won the award.
It’s a rare thing to see in EuroLeague but then again, this last year Shane Larkin grew accustomed to making unique achievements look like the stuff of a day-to-day routine. And if the 2019-2020 season was completed and Anadolu Efes made the Final Four (which looked like the most probable outcome), then it would be shocking if Larkin wasn’t named the EuroLeague MVP.
One could easily argue that there has never been a stronger case for MVP in, well, ages. While his Efes was overlooking the rest of the teams from the 1st place in the standings, Larkin was transforming himself into a multi-megaton nuclear warhead each time he stepped on the court; a fireball that packed the heat of previously unseen offensive prowess in the competition this century. He was destroying scoring records, leaving everyone else behind in each weekly MVP race, single-handedly bending opposing defenses to his will and winning games by his own sheer determination.
Not only was Larkin the EuroLeague leader in PIR (25.8) and scoring (22.2 points while playing less than 30 minutes per game) while delivering dimes as well (4.1 assists) as the best player in the first-placed team, but he also exhibited a near-ridiculous potency, especially given his daring, confidence-oozing style. Despite taking all sorts of tough shots, releasing the ball over raised hands, making off-balance stepbacks, and slashing his way through seas of bodies to sometimes finish under pressure, he was ranked 15th overall in True Shooting and first among guards with 55.3%, including a superb 50.5% (88-173) on 3-pointers.
Jordi Bertomeu said that no individual awards will be given since there were so many games left in the season. It makes sense. To the eyes of many, Shane Larkin is the season MVP and no lack of the related silverware can steal from him the right to be considering himself as such.