Maccabi puts Arroyo at point

One of Puerto Rico's top players ever, point guard Carlos Arroyo, is returning to the Euroleague to join last season's runners-up, Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv.

The signing of Arroyo (188, 29) for next year, plus an option for two more, is expected to complete Maccabi's roster for the 2008-09 season. Arroyo arrives after a seven-year NBA career, at the beginning of which he had come to the Euroleague in the middle of the 2001-02 season for several games with Tau Ceramica of Spain.

After short stints with Toronto and Denver of the NBA, Arroyo had his best season in Utah, where he averaged 12.6 points and 5 assists in 2003-04, before playing in the NBA finals with Detroit and spending the last two seasons in Orlando. Arroyo has also helped lift his national team to new heights in recent years.

He is perhaps best known as Puerto Rico's leading scorer in a victory to open the 2004 Summer Games in Athens that marked the first Olympic Games defeat by a U.S. national team with NBA players. Puerto Rico finished sixth in Athens and moved up to fifth place at the 2006 World Championships, where Arroyo ranked second in assists, with 5.2 per game, and fifth in scoring, with 21.2 points on average.

"I'm very happy we've completed this signing," Maccabi coach Effi Birnboim told the club's official Web site. "Arroyo is a player of the highest standard and has been our top priority for a while.

"Luckily for me, Maccabi's management agreed to sign him despite the huge costs. This is exactly the player we need. He's a great basketball player as well as being a great leader."

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