101 Greats of European Basketball

Vladimir Stankovic
sign Nikos Georgallis was Aris Thessaloniki. The president
of the club, Menelaos Hagigeorgiu, traveled to
New Jersey, and with his sincere words he convinced
Nikos’s parents and, after them, Nikos himself. But the
deal was for one year only, until the end of the season.
His arrival in Thessaloniki brought about many
doubts, especially because of his physical stature. Instead
of a shooting guard or a tall forward, here was a young
kid whose body didn’t promise especially good things. He
spoke Greek poorly and could not express himself well
or understand what was wanted from him. But from the
first practice, and later when the games started, the “little
American” shut everyone’s mouths. He scored with unbelievable
ease. Defenses would do everything against him,
but nobody could stop the rain of points.
His official debut came on December 2, 1979, against
Iraklis. Galis finished the game with 30 points. At the beginning
of 1980, a new coach arrived to the Aris bench:
Dusan Ivkovic, the Serbian coach who had led Partizan
to the Yugoslav League title in 1979. He saw Galis’s enormous
potential on the spot. Galis soon became the idol of
the fans – and not only Aris’s. He finished the season as
the third-best scorer in the league, averaging 33.0 points.
But there was a player who scored more than him, Panagiotis
Giannakis of the small Athens club, Ionikos, with 36.5.
Already in 1980, Galis made his debut with the Greek
national team against Sweden and scored his first 12
points. From then on, he enjoyed life in Greece and
decided to forget about the NBA and signed again with
Aris. He finished the next season with an average of 43.9
points (!) and, against Ionikos, set a Greek League record
with 63 points. However, Aris finished third behind
Panathinaikos and Olympiacos in the standings. In the
1983-84 season, Aris lost the title in a tiebreaker against
Panathinaikos played on the island of Corfu. New coach
Giannis Ioannidis was also becoming an important part
of Galis’s career, but there was still something missing.
When the club directors managed to sign Giannakis
from Ionikos, and 2.17-meter big man Dimitris Kokolakis,
all the pieces of the puzzle were in place.
In their first season, the Galis-Giannakis duo worked
perfectly. Aris won the Greek League with only one
defeat and Galis was the best scorer with an average
of 34.0 points. They key was that Galis and Giannakis
switched between point guard and shooting guard as
they pleased. It was the birth of one of the best duos
ever in European basketball.
Miracle in Piraeus
For the 1986-87 season, a playoff was introduced
in the Greek League. Aris won the title again – this time
with no losses – and Galis scored a total of 808 points for
an average of 40! To top it off, Galis then led the Greek
national team to the EuroBasket title in 1987 in Athens.
Galis was already a well-known and respected player
in Europe. At EuroBasket in both 1981 and 1983,
he had been named to the all-tournament teams. He
also had been the top scorer at the 1986 World Cup in
Spain, with 33.3 points per game. There, with his personal
best of 53 points against Panama, Galis for the
first time outscored Oscar Schmidt in an international
competition, averaging 33.7 points.
Now, playing at home in the 1987 EuroBasket, the
victims of Greece and Galis before the final were Romania
(Galis, 44 points), Yugoslavia (44), Spain (35), USSR (31),
France (34), Italy (38) and Yugoslavia, again, in the semis
(30). But his big day was on June 17, 1987. In front of 17,000
fans, Nikos Galis scored 40 points against the USSR and,
thanks to him, Greece claimed the title in overtime, 103-
101. His average was 37.8 points. He committed just 7
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