Tornike Shengelia

Tornike "Toko" Shengelia (Georgian: თორნიკე შენგელია; born October 5, 1991) is a Georgian professional basketball player who plays for Baskonia of the Liga ACB.

Professional career

Early career

From 2008 to 2010, Shengelia played for both Valencia Basket and its junior team, Valencia BC Sunny Delight. In 2010, he signed with Spirou Charleroi of Belgium, who later loaned him to VOO Verviers-Pepinster for the 2010–11 season. In August 2011, it was announced that he would play for Spirou Charleroi in 2011–12.^[1]

NBA

Shengelia was selected with the 54th overall pick in the 2012 NBA draft by Philadelphia 76ers. He was later traded to the Brooklyn Nets on draft night. In July 2012, he joined the Nets for the 2012 NBA Summer League. In 5 games, he averaged 10.2 points and 3.6 rebounds per game.^[2]

On July 24, 2012, Shengelia signed with the Nets.^[3] During his rookie and sophomore seasons, he had multiple assignments with the Springfield Armor of the NBA D-League.^{[4] [5]}

On January 21, 2014, Shengelia was traded to the Chicago Bulls in exchange for Marquis Teague.^[6] On April 14, 2014, he was waived by the Bulls.^[7]

Baskonia

On June 21, 2014, Shengelia signed a three-year deal with Baskonia.^[8]

On March 1, 2015, the basque derby with Bilbao Basket finished with a brawl where Dejan Todorović of Bilbao and he were disqualified and twelve players were ejected due to court invasion during the fight.^[9]

With four seconds left and Bilbao winning by a huge margin, despite the referee's call for a travelling, Todorović was going to dunk when Todorović was hit by him. After this, the Serbian player pushed him from behind and the Georgian forward reacted with a punch. After this, all the players who were in the bench came into the court and started the brawl. When Shengelia was leaving the court after the disqualifying foul, he apologized to a child who was in the first row of the arena.^[10]

The ACB announced this brawl would have severe consequences and sanctions and would talk with the Spanish Basketball Federation for changing the disciplinary regulations.^[11] On March 5, the league provisionally suspended Todorović and Shengelia until the final resolution of the case.^[12]

Both clubs claimed to have the same sanctions than in 2004, when the brawl Real Madrid and Estudiantes occurred.^[13] Finally, on March 11, the Disciplinary Judge accorded to suspend him for five games, Todorović for four and a €3,000 fine to Bilbao Basket player Dairis Bertāns and to Baskonia brothers Mamadou and Ilimane Diop.^[14]

On June 7, 2017, Shengelia signed a three-year contract extension with Baskonia.^[15]

International career

Shengelia plays for the senior men's Georgian national team. During the EuroBasket 2011, he averaged 8.8 points, 4.6 rebounds and 1.1 assists per game.

Career statistics

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.

NBA

Regular season

EuroLeague

Domestic leagues

Season	Team	League	GP	MPG	FG%	3P%	FT%	RPG	APG	SPG	BPG	PPG
2008–09	Pamesa Valencia	ACB	6	10.5	.620	.000	.800	1.7	.5	.5	.2	3.3
2009–10	Pamesa Valencia B	EBA	21	29.5	.539	.290	.481	8.0	1.9	.9	1.0	15.7
2010–11	Verviers-Pepinster	BLB	32	17.0	.511	.130	.750	4.1	.5	.8	.3	6.5
2011–12	Belgacom Spirou	BLB	29	18.4	.494	.279	.628	4.8	1.1	1.1	.3	8.8
2012–13	Springfield Armor	NBA D-League	10	36.6	.581	.366	.675	8.2	4.0	2.3	1.0	24.3
2013–14	Springfield Armor	NBA D-League	4	27.3	.615	.200	.818	5.0	1.5	.5	1.3	13.3
2014–15	Baskonia	ACB	31	20.3	.532	.362	.804	4.0	1.0	.5	.4	10.1
2015–16	Baskonia	ACB	19	17.0	.580	.300	.750	3.6	0.9	.6	.5	8.7

References

External links

• Career statistics and player information from Basketball-Reference.com
• Tornike Shengelia at acb.com (in Spanish)
• Tornike Shengelia at draftexpress.com
• Tornike Shengelia at eurobasket.com
• Tornike Shengelia at euroleague.net
• Tornike Shengelia at nba.com
• Tornike Shengelia on Twitter