A star turn in a historic performance for his club has earned Cholet Basket scorer Sammy Mejia the Sportingbet MVP honor for Week 5 of the Turkish Airlines Euroleague regular season. Mejia scored 29 points – the most in the Euroleague this season and the most ever by a Cholet player in Europe’s premier competition – to lead his team to an 82-78 win over previously unbeaten Fenerbahce Ulker. The victory marked the first time Cholet has ever won three straight games in the Euroleague.
Mejia made 9 of 12 two-pointers – many of them on silky-smooth mid-range pull-up jumpers – sank 8 of 10 free throws and added 5 rebounds and 3 assists en route to a performance index rating of 35. His was the second-best single-game index rating this season, behind the previous week’s Sportingbet MVP, Berni Rodriguez of Unicaja. Week 5’s second-best performances came from Lietuvos Rytas rising star Jonas Valanciunas and Maccabi Electra swingman Chuck Eidson. Valanciunas scored 15 points on near-perfect shooting, grabbed 9 rebounds and swatted 2 shots for a 26 index rating to help L. Rytas nail its first win of the season, 90-62 over Cibona. Eidson’s index rating of 26 came with 20 points, 4 rebounds, 3 assists and 5 steals as Maccabi smacked Asseco Prokom 99-58. Eidson, who had been the Week 1 MVP, now leads the competition with an average index rating of 18.6.
Rounding out the best Week 5 performances are reigning Euroleague MVP Milos Teodosic, who had 15 points, 7 assists and a 24 index rating as Olympiacos won 71-86 at Lottomatica Roma. Big man Andrea Crosariol of Roma tied Caja Laboral forward Fernando San Emeterio, each with index ratings of 23, for the week’s fifth-best performance.