Ex-Atlanta Hawks guard goes off for Germany in EuroBasket
The Atlanta Hawks are well represented by ex-players at EuroBasket 2022. Their only current eligible European who could be playing, Bogdan Bogdanovic is not representing Serbia due to being out for three months thanks to a surgical procedure on his knee just after the NBA season was complete.
With Danilo Gallinari suffering his knee injury, Dennis Schroder is the best ex-Hawks player left in the tournament. While he is still to secure an NBA deal for next season, he is one of the top remaining free agents and the Los Angeles Lakers are pretty interested in the offensively-minded guard.
Still, Schroder is using EuroBasket to make sure teams are keeping him at the top of their thinking. He struggled a little in the first game of the tournament but was still able to help Germany beat the higher-ranked French national team that had another ex-Hawks player, Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot.
Ex-Atlanta Hawks guard Dennis Schroder went off for the German national team.
The German’s second match of the EuroBasket tournament was against the lower-ranked Bosnia and Herzegovina whose only NBA player is Jusuf Nurkic from the Portland Trail Blazers. For reference, Germany is ranked 11th in the world, and Bosnia and Herzegovina are ranked 46th in the world.
However, there is a difference between having talent and using it effectively. Schroder made sure that his team was going to come out on top in this contest. He scored 18 points on 6-of-27 shooting, including 1-of-3 from deep. He also made all five of his free throws.
However, where Schroder took over the game was setting up his teammates. He had nine of Germany’s 18 assists and no other player in the game had more than four. On top of that, Schroder only had one assist which was a much better performance than the last game.
So far, only Germany and defending EuroBasket champion Slovenia have not lost a game in Group B. This is going a long way to Schroder’s goal of leading Germany deep into the tournament.