The 26-year-old center pulled off a player-of-the-game performance against Maccabi
Moses Wright offers Olympiacos another option ahead of postseason: 'It’s been great to be back'
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Regular Season
Round 34 of 34
Group Regular Season
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Moses Wright’s season took an unexpected turn back in December, when reports stated that he may miss the remainder of the campaign due to a serious health issue.
Despite being Olympiacos Piraeus’s third-choice center in Georgios Bartzokas’s pecking order behind Moustapha Fall and Nikola Milutinov, Wright offers the Reds something distinctive with his energy, work ethic and ability to run the court.
With four games to go until the end of the 2024-25 Turkish Airlines EuroLeague regular season, and Wright having been given the medical all-clear, Bartzokas was forced to rush the 26-year-old back into action due to Milutinov’s absence through injury at LDLC ASVEL Villeurbanne. His minutes have gradually increased ever since, with Wright netting 8 points in 13:47 minutes on the floor against ALBA Berlin last week.
With both Fall and Milutinov sidelined in Olympiacos’s last game of the season, it was time for Wright to send a message loud and clear.
“I’ve been out for so long,” he told EuroLeague TV after Olympiacos’s 99-93 win over Maccabi Playtika Tel Aviv on Thursday night. “It’s been great to be back on the court. I’ve been missing basketball so much. Getting out there, fighting for my teammates.”
And fight from the off he did. Wright scored half of his team’s first 12 points before heading to the bench for a well-deserved breather. After charging up his batteries, he returned to the court to provide his team with an energy boost on both ends, effectively filling the frontcourt void left by the two absent Olympiacos bigs.
Wright went 7 for 10 from inside to finish the game with 18 points, 6 rebounds, 3 assists, 2 blocks and 1 steal for a team-high PIR of 28. Most importantly, he provided Olympiacos with a valuable extra option off the bench ahead of the much anticipated playoffs.
“The playoffs are such a big thing in everybody’s life,” Wright added. “Everybody who plays sports always wants to get to the postseason and just do great in the postseason.”
A player with different qualities from Fall and Milutinov, Wright has already proved in the past he can pull off a game-changing outing when his team needs to flip the switch. Fall and Milutinov are expected to be fit in time for postseason, but their fellow center proved on Thursday night that he’s rediscovering his form just in time and he’s ready to step up when it matters most.