TURKEY BOUND – Mixed weekend for Teodosic

PARIS (2010 FIBA World Championship) - The weekend in Paris proved to be bittersweet for Serbia point guard Milos Teodosic of Olympiacos.

After helping the Reds beat Partizan Belgrade in a thrilling semi-final on Friday, Teodosic was one day later named as the Euroleague Player of the Year.

Feeling unwell and unable to attend the ceremony where he was to be honored, Teodosic returned to the court on Sunday to play in the final against Barcelona but suffered along with the rest of his teammates as they fell 86-68.

Teodosic, a former youth player in his national-team set-up, played very little one year ago for Olympiacos but he blossomed into one of the brightest stars in Europe while helping Serbia capture a silver medal at EuroBasket 2009.

Just 22 years of age at the time, Teodosic was voted to the all-tournament team in Poland.

Now 23, Teodosic will this summer represent the Serbians at the FIBA World Championship in Turkey.

Aleks Maric of Partizan Belgrade had an incredible year and was also named in the Euroleague starting five.

Maric, 25, averaged 14.6 points and 8.4 rebounds per game for Partizan as they made a surprising run to the Final Four where they lost two games in overtime, including Sunday to CSKA Moscow.

Maric's role with Australia's national team is going to be important following Monday's announcement that the Boomers' starting center Andrew Bogut will not play in Turkey because of injuries.

Three other players headed to the FIBA World Championship with their respective countries made the Euroleague starting five.

Juan Carlos Navarro of Spain, who was the Final Four MVP, along with Lithuania's Linas Kleiza and Russia's Viktor Khryapa, were All-Euroleague First Team selections.

A Second Team selection was Tiago Splitter of Caja Laboral.

Splitter will represent Brazil at the FIBA World Championship.

Bo McCalebb of Partizan, Josh Childress of Olympiacos, Ramunas Siskauskas of CSKA Moscow and Erazem Lorbek of Barcelona were also Second Team selections.

Lithuania have named Siskauskas in their preliminary squad for Turkey while Lorbek has decided not to make himself available for national team duty this summer.

FIBA