Every Wednesday during the NBA season, interbasket takes a closer look at ten international NBA players that has caught our eye. This week is for period 11/15-11/21/2007.

After three years of gathering splinters on the bench (and two championship rings), and with Jacque Vaughn getting the backup PG calls, little-used Beno Udrih was finally traded by the Spurs. The Minnesota Timberwolves then promptly waived the guard from Slovenia.

With the injury to Mike Bibby that will keep him out of action for nearly two months, Udrih was then signed by Sacramento and is now the team’s starting point guard. Beno had 23 points and 6 assists in Sacramento’s impressive win over Detroit and is putting up 13 points, 4 assists 2.7 rebounds, and 1.1 steals in six games with the Kings before he was injured in Tuesday’s game with a thigh contusion.

Unlike Udrih, Luis Scola never got the chance to don a Spurs jersey, garner splinters and be on the receiving end of a Gregg Popovich spit-filled tirade. Scola was shipped off to Houston in hopes of more playing time and not taking any minutes from fellow Argentine Fabricio Oberto. Scola came in with high-expectations and many labeling him and Kevin Durant as the serious rookie of the year candidates, but the transition hasn’t been nearly as smooth as all had hoped. Scola was struggling to find his way, and from a few games that I watched, it seemed his teammates had lost confidence in his abilities.

With Tracy McGrady injured and unable to look Scola off, Luis grabbed the opportunity to show off his wares – mid-range jumpshots, rolls to the hoops to the tune of 10-11 shooting and 20 points against… well, the Spurs. Coincidence? Probably. “It kills me to have him on that team,” Popovich said after the game, “Enough to make you spit.” Whoa, relax Pop, don’t go spitting. The man needs anger management!

Scola followed his breakout game with 20 points (on a career high 19 FG attempts), 11 rebounds and 4 assists against the Suns – unfortunately the Rockets lost both those games and have lost 4 straight after starting the season off 6-1, but it’s good to see Scola finally getting his confidence back. Hopefully when McGrady returns, the Rockets can incorporate the 2006 Spanish league MVP.

I love Manu Ginobili, but really, I am tired of talking about how he’s having a fantastic year and looks revived and is the most-exciting NBA player to watch yada yada yada… luckily I can talk about his international backcourt mate Tony Parker. After a couple slow games, Parker torched the Hawks for 17 points in the second quarter, and 31 points for the game last night. TP started the season strong but has since settled; his stats so far this season almost mirror the previous 3 seasons – 18 points, no more than 6 assists a game, 3.5 rebounds, 1 steal a game, 50% from the field on 14 shots a game. I thought Tim Duncan was supposed to the boring and consistent one?

After having another 0 point outing, Juan Carlos Navarro found his stroke in his eighth NBA game; going 8-9 from three-point and totaling 28 points in their loss to New Orleans. With those eight threes, Navarro tied a rookie-record for threes made (shared by Jason Kidd and Chris Duhon). Since then Navarro’s shooting has been much improved (it helps to go 8-9), following his record-setting night, he has gone 4-8 and 4-5 to help offset his dismal start to the season.

Andrea Bargnani has been an enigma this season. There doesn’t seem to be any pattern as to if he’ll play well one game and awful in the next. The season’s only eleven games deep and already Bargnani has had enough highs and lows to fill a NBA schedule. The 2006 number-one draft pick started out the season with 20.5 points, 5.5 rebounds on excellent shooting in two wins for the Raptors – then couldn’t find his shot in the three consecutive losses (32% FG). Bargnani was benched for five games which didn’t improve his shooting confidence much (35%) before he was re-inserted into the starting lineup last night in a heart-breaking loss to the Mavs (he had 20 points and was 5-9 from three).

Golden State put a stop to their winless ways with more than a little help from their Latvian center Andris Biedrins. In their two wins, Biedrins has averaged a monster double-double 19 points and 16 rebounds at 71% from the field. Before Wednesday’s game against the Knicks, Biedrins was averaging a career high in minutes (36), points (13.4), rebounds (11.1), assists (1.9), blocks (1.9), and FT% (70%) (also personal fouls and turnovers, but that comes with the territory of being more involved). Let’s all keep in mind that this is only Biedrins fourth NBA season and he just turned 21 years old in April. I think we’re looking at another international superstar in the making….

Speaking of international big men, is Zydrunas Ilgaukskas really only 32 years old? I guess he was the Greg Oden of his day, looking much older than he actually is. It doesn’t help, despite his soft touch and consistent midrange jumper, that he’s always been slow and hulking around the basket which only served to emphasize his Oden-ness.

After playing all 82 games in his first season, Zydrunas missed 155 games the next three seasons. However, since then Big Z has only missed 14 games in the last five seasons. And this season Ilgauskas is looking like a beast on the boards, demolishing his career average by 4 rebounds per game. The Lithuanian giant is averaging 16pts, 12.1 rebounds, 1.5 blocks on 50% shooting and 84% from the free-throw in nearly 34 minutes a game while holding down the middle for the Cavs. Anderson Varejao who?

Anderson Varejao who? Oh, him. Yeah, the guy that’s still holding out and wants $10m/season (the Cavs are offering $6m). I like Varejao, but c’mon man… someone really should send him a tape of himself playing, particularly of that spin-move prayer during game three of last year’s NBA finals.

Really, this guy must have a warped sense of what he really brings to the table. I am beginning to believe the accounts from the 2006 World Championships when Varejao’s elbow broke Greece’s three bones in Nikos Zisis’ face. Varejao reportedly told him that Nikos didn’t respect him enough, enough for him to elbow an opponents face – I am seeing a little of that in his holding out.

The Dallas Mavs haven’t missed a beat — and that historically meant that Dirk Nowitzki was tearing things up — but thats just not the case this season (before last night when Nowitzki hit four straight 3-pointers in the final 1:41 of the third quarter to bring the Mavs back from a 24 point deficit against Toronto).

With Josh Howard leading the team in scoring at 21.9 a game, Jason Terry motivated by his sixth man role (with a starter-like 20.3), and Devin Harris continuing to improve (15.4ppg), the Mavs can afford Dirk’s slow start. Before his 32 point outing against Toronto last night, Nowitzki was shooting at career lows across the board FG (44.5%), 3PT (26.1%) and FT (78.1%). The last time Dirty has shot at a lower percentage in his career was when he was a rookie (40.5% FG, 20.6% 3pT, and 77.3% from the FT); when everyone thought Don Nelson was crazy for picking the wunderkind. No doubt Dirk will pick up the pace, and if the other guys are rolling as they have been, the Mavs are going to be even tougher.

I don’t know about you, but I have yet to be convinced of Sasha Vujacic. He keeps showing up on the Laker’s roster year after year, but I’ve never seen much out of him when I saw him play.

Looking at his stats this year, it might not be obvious that anything has changed this year – but if you look deeper, you can see that Vujacic is having a very promising start to the season. Currently, the backup guard from Slovenia is averaging a career best in points (6.5), in only around nine minutes a game, his lowest mpg of his career thus far.

It’s not his points or assists, it’s Sasha’s efficiency from the floor which has seen his shooting percentages near Steve Nash levels. Given, thats not a fair comparison seeing as Vujacic shoots about 3.5 times a game, but instead of shooting at a low-30% clip, he’s hitting over half his shots this year. “Sasha last year made every shot in practice — and couldn’t make one in a game,” Kobe Bryant said. “Now he’s starting to put `em together, so it’s cool.”

Other notes: Man, I would really hate to be an opposing NBA center when Dwight Howard hits his prime. That guy is seriously a beast; I’m talking Shaquille O’Neal freak-of-nature-size-plus-athleticism-scary (and the terrible FT%). D-Ho (there’s got to be a better nickname than that) is putting up 22pts, 14rebs, and 2.4 blocks on pure overwhelming athleticism without a go-to move or a back to the basket game.

Sources: Sacramento Kings sign guard Beno Udrih to fill in for Mike Bibby (CanadianPress), Popovich and R.C. Buford: How Scola and Udrih got away (MySA.com), Raptors still have confidence in slumping Bargnani (Canada.com), Dallas Comes Back from 24 point deficit to defeat Toronto 105-99 (Yahoo!), Lakers trying to figure out backcourt minutes (Honolulu Advertiser),