He may not be the biggest or strongest player on the court, but has any player been as consistently productive over such a long period as Nando De Colo of Fenerbahce Beko Istanbul? Whether scoring in a multitude of ways or setting up his teammates, De Colo has always been difficult to slow down.
Milestones: De Colo climbed the charts in 2020-21
Stats
4 mins read
Whether scoring in a multitude of ways or setting up his teammates, Nando De Colo of Fenerbahce Beko Istanbul has always been difficult to slow down.
Since he signed with CSKA Moscow ahead of the 2014-15 campaign, De Colo has been in the 50-40-90 club of shooting excellence for a record seven consecutive seasons. He leads the EuroLeague's all-time charts in career free-throw shooting percentage (94.0%), having missed just 56 of 928 attempts. He has made 346 three-point shots, 14th all time, with none of the 13 players ahead of him having better accuracy rate than his 42.7% from downtown. That efficiency has led to De Colo winning the EuroLeague twice, earning six All-EuroLeague selections and taking home the MVP trophy in 2016.
This season De Colo became the second player to record 4,000 performance index rating points in the EuroLeague He needed just 223 games to reach this achievement and did so at the age of 33 years and 304 days. The only other player to reach that milestone was three-time EuroLeague champion Vassilis Spanoulis, who needed 322 games– 99 more than De Colo – and was significantly older – 37 years and 169 days old – when he did it.
Spanoulis's long-time running mate at Olympiacos Piraeus, Georgios Printezis, also had a significant milestone this season when he became the eighth player to reach 3,500 in PIR. Unlike De Colo, Printezis's climb up the charts was slow and steady as he needed the most games of the eight and was the second oldest among them to reach that number.
In the 2020-21 season, De Colo also became just the third player to score his 3,500th point in the competition and, as with his PIR totals, he was the youngest of the three and reached the milestone in the fewest games. Two other former EuroLeague MVPs joined the 3,000-point club last season. De Colo's former CSKA Moscow backcourt mate Sergio Rodriguez, now with AX Armani Exchange Milan, needed 282 games to get there. Rodriguez's former Real Madrid teammate Sergio Llull did it in the 286th game of this career. By comparison, De Colo achieved 3,500 points in 221 games.
Looking ahead, De Colo needs 424 points to become the third player to reach 4,000 in EuroLeague history. Based on his current career average (16.0 ppg.), De Colo would need 27 games to get there and thus join Juan Carlos Navarro and Spanoulis. Navarro needed 319 games to break the 4,000-point mark and Spanoulis did it in 303 games.
Because he is significantly younger than others so high on the list, it would not be a surprise to see De Colo ascend atop the all-time scoring and PIR charts at some point. De Colo is second all-time in PIR (4,022), trailing only Spanoulis (4,183). Last season, De Colo amassed a PIR of 602, while Spanoulis has retired.
De Colo should need more time to become the competition's all-time top scorer. He enters the 2021-22 season ranked third overall (3,576), behind Spanoulis (4,455) and Navarro (4,152). Printezis should join the 3,500-point club soon, as he ranks fourth with 3,474. None of them – Printezis, Navarro nor Spanoulis – ever had a 50-40-90 season, and De Colo has had seven, which is just another reason why he has reached PIR and points milestones quicker than anyone else. At age 34, De Colo is showing no signs of slowing down, so expect him to keep challenging for titles and records.