Aleksej Pokuševski

Aleksej Pokuševski (Serbian Cyrillic: Алексеј Покушевски; born December 26, 2001) is a Serbian professional basketball player for Olympiacos Piraeus of the EuroLeague, as well as the club's reserve team.

Aleksej Pokuševski
No. 20 – Olympiacos
PositionSmall forward / Power forward
LeagueEuroLeague
Personal information
Born (2001-12-26) December 26, 2001
Belgrade, Serbia, FR Yugoslavia
NationalitySerbian / Greek[1][2]
Listed height2.13 m (7 ft 0 in)
Listed weight93 kg (205 lb)
Career information
Playing career2019–present
Career history
2019–presentOlympiacos Piraeus
2019–present→ Olympiacos B
Career highlights and awards

Pokuševski shone as a youth player for the Greek club, Olympiacos Pireaus. He debuted for their senior team in 2019, at age 17, becoming the youngest EuroLeague player in club history.

In addition to being a citizen of Serbia, Pokuševski also has Greek citizenship.[1]

Early career

Pokuševski grew up in Novi Sad, where he started to play youth basketball for the local clubs, KK Kadet and KK NS Stars. In 2015, Pokuševski joined the youth teams of Olympiacos. In 2017, he participated in the Jordan Brand Classic camp. In August 2018, he participated at the Basketball Without Borders Europe camp, in Belgrade, Serbia.[3] In February 2019, Pokuševski participated at the NBA All-Star Basketball Without Borders Global Camp, in Charlotte, North Carolina.[4]

Professional career

On March 19, 2019, Pokuševski made his EuroLeague debut with Olympiacos Piraeus, in a 89–69 win over the German club Bayern Munich, during the EuroLeague's 2018–19 season. He recorded 1 point, 2 rebounds and 1 assist, in one minute played during the game.[5] Pokuševski became the youngest senior men's Olympiacos player to ever debut in the EuroLeague. At 17 years and 83 days old, he replaced Georgios Printezis, who had previously debuted in the EuroLeague, at the age of 17 years and 229 days, as the club's youngest ever EuroLeague player.[6]

For the 2019–20 season, Pokuševski was assigned to play in the Greek A2 League, the country's second-tier league, with Olympiacos' reserve team, Olympiacos B. He initially played for the senior EuroLeague club's practice squad. Pokuševski started in eight of his 11 appearances in the Greek A2, averaging 10.8 points, 7.9 rebounds, 3.1 assists, 1.3 steals, and 1.8 blocks in 23.1 minutes per game. He shot 40.4 percent from the field, 32.1 percent from 3-point range, and 78.3 percent from the free-throw line.[7] In the middle of the season, Olympiacos' main EuroLeague team was riddled with injuries, and Pokuševski was called up to the senior team. He played two minutes in his only EuroLeague game of the season,[8] before the league's season was suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe. On April 24, 2020, he declared for the 2020 NBA draft.[9] Pokuševski earned Greek A2 Bosman eligible Player of the Year and All-Defensive Team honors from the website Eurobasket.com.[10]

National team career

Pokuševski was a member of the Serbian national under-17 team that competed at the 2018 FIBA Under-17 World Cup, in Argentina. Over seven tournament games, he averaged 7.7 points, 8.3 rebounds, 1.6 assists, and 3.0 blocks per game.[11]

Pokuševski was a member of the Serbian national under-18 team that competed at the 2019 FIBA Under-18 European Championship, in Volos, Greece. Over seven tournament games, he averaged 10.0 points, 7.2 rebounds, 3.7 assists, 2.7 steals, and 4.0 blocks per game.[12]

Career statistics
Legend
  GP Games played   GS  Games started  MPG  Minutes per game
 FG%  Field-goal percentage  3P%  3-point field-goal percentage  FT%  Free-throw percentage
 RPG  Rebounds per game  APG  Assists per game  SPG  Steals per game
 BPG  Blocks per game  PPG  Points per game  PIR  Performance Index Rating
 Bold  Career high

Note: The EuroLeague is not the only competition in which the player participated for the team during the season. He also played in domestic competition, and regional competition if applicable.

EuroLeague
Year Team GP GS MPG FG% 3P% FT% RPG APG SPG BPG PPG PIR
2018–19 Olympiacos 202.9.000.000.5001.0.5.5.0.5.0
2019–20 102.000——0.0.0.0.0.0-2.0
Career[13] 302.7.000.000.500.7.3.3.0.3-.7

Personal life

Pokuševski's family originates from Priština, Kosovo. Due to the Kosovo War in 1999, his family escaped to Podgorica (nowadays in Montenegro), and moved to Belgrade, Serbia afterwards, where Pokuševski was born in 2001. Thereafter, Pokuševski and his family permanently moved to Novi Sad.[14]

After signing a youth team contract with the Greek basketball club Olympiacos, Pokuševski moved to Greece in 2015, at the age of 13. While playing in Greek competitions, he counts as a native Greek domestic player, since he started competing in Greek competitions before the age of 14.[15] He was eligible to represent either Serbia or Greece in national team competitions, and he chose to represent Serbia.[1]

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References
  1. "About Aleksej Pokusevski". nba.com. Retrieved 24 June 2020.
  2. "The progress card of 10 European NBA draft prospects". eurohoops.net. Retrieved 24 June 2020.
  3. "Jokic, Vucevic Headline Basketball Without Borders Europe 2018". global.nba.com. Retrieved 20 March 2019.
  4. "2019 NBA All-Stars Nikola Jokić and Nikola Vučević, Deandre Ayton and Bogdan Bogdanović to coach top international prospects at fifth annual Basketball Without Borders Camp". pr.nba.com. Retrieved 20 March 2019.
  5. "2018-19 Regular Season Round 27 Olympiacos Piraeus 89 - 69 FC Bayern Munich". euroleague.net. Retrieved 20 March 2019.
  6. "Aleksej Pokusevski became youngest ever Olympiacos player to debut in EuroLeague". eurohoops.net. Retrieved 20 March 2019.
  7. International Regular Season Stats - Per Game.
  8. POKUSEVSKI, ALEKSEJ OLYMPIACOS PIRAEUS EuroLeague 2019-20 STATISTICS.
  9. Giviony, Jonathan. "Serbian forward Aleksej Pokusevski declares for NBA draft". espn.com. Retrieved 24 April 2020.
  10. Mammides, Chris (April 17, 2020). "Eurobasket.com All-Greek A2 Awards 2020". Eurobasket.com. Retrieved May 17, 2020.
  11. "Aleksej POKUSEVSKI at the 2018 FIBA Under-17 Basketball World Cup". fiba.basketball. Retrieved 20 March 2019.
  12. "2019 Serbia U18 - Pokusevski". fiba.basketball. Retrieved 8 August 2019.
  13. POKUSEVSKI, ALEKSEJ Career Stats EuroLeague.
  14. "Zapamtite ovo ime – Aleksej Pokuševski VIDEO". b92.net (in Serbian). Retrieved 20 March 2019.
  15. The progress card of 10 European NBA draft prospects.
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