Ioannis Athinaiou


Ioannis Athinaiou is a Greek professional basketball player for Peristeri of the Greek Basket League and the Basketball Champions League. He is 1.94 m tall. and 96 kg. He can play at both the point guard and shooting guard positions.

Youth career

Athinaiou played from a young age in Poseidonas, a club in Psychiko, Athens, Greece, before he started his pro career.

Professional career

Athinaiou first played professionally with the Greek clubs Ilysiakos, Panionios, and KAOD. In the summer of 2009, he signed a 4-year contract with Panionios. He joined the Greek League club Aris, in 2013.
He joined the Italian League club Olimpia Milano, in 2014. In May, he parted ways with the team. He signed with the Greek EuroLeague team Olympiacos, in 2015. With Olympiacos, he won the Greek League championship in 2016. He returned to Aris, for the 2017–18 season.
On July 29, 2018, he signed a two-year contract with Aris' arch-rivals, PAOK. In January 2019, he joined the French League club Fos Provence.
On August 12, 2019, he moved to the Greek EuroLeague club Panathinaikos. After joining Panathinaikos, Athinaiou became the first player in history to be a member of all five of the largest Greek basketball teams, having been a member of Panathinaikos, Olympiacos, AEK, PAOK and Aris. Just a few days later, however, Athinaiou got very unlucky, as he suffered from a torn ACL in a national team friendly game against Serbia, just two weeks prior to the 2019 FIBA Basketball World Cup. As a result, he missed the entirety of the shortened, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020 campaign with the Greens.
On July 16, 2020, Athinaiou officially signed with Peristeri.

National team career

Athinaiou was a member of the Greek university national team. He played at the 2007 World University Games. He has also been a member of the senior Greek national basketball team. He played with Greece at the 2016 Turin FIBA World Olympic Qualifying Tournament. He also played at the 2019 FIBA World Cup qualification, where he had a game-winning buzzer-beating 3 pointer against Great Britain.

Awards and accomplishments