After a standout season competing in the top pro basketball league in Hungary, former Gonzaga men’s basketball point guard Ryan Woolridge is headed back to Greece.
On Thursday, the 27-year-old Texas native signed a deal with Panionios B.C. Athens, a club based in South Athens, Greece, that will compete in the Greek Basketball League (also known as the Stoiximan Greek Basketball League for sponsorship reasons) this upcoming season. The GBL is regarded as the top-tier level in the Greek basketball league system and consists of 12 teams, with each season’s lowest-placed team being relegated to the A2 Basketball League.
Panionios was the runner-up in the A2 Basketball League last season, which means Woolridge will have a chance to compete against the best pro talent Greece has to offer after putting together his best season as a pro in Hungary.
In 29 games with SZTE-Szedeak Szeged, Woolridge led the Hungary A Division in player efficiency rating while averaging 20.6 points, which was fourth-most in the league. He also led the league in steals (2.2 per game), was top-five in rebounds per game (8.5) and dished out the sixth-most assists per game (5.7) in the A Division. AS Szedeak advanced to the cup final, Woolridge was named Eurobasket.com’s All-Hungarian A Division Import Player of the Year.
The 2024-25 season is slated to be Woolridge’s third full year playing professional basketball overseas. After going undrafted out of Gonzaga in 2020, he signed with Meid Bayreuth of the Basketball Bundesliga in July 2020, though Woolridge ended up playing just seven games before leaving the club later that December for an opportunity to play in the NBA G League. In the 2020-21 campaign, he logged 14 games with the Oklahoma City Blue and put up 6.6 points and 4.1 assists per game.
Woolridge returned to Europe the following season after inking a deal with Iraklis Thessaloniki of the GBL, where he suited up alongside NBA veterans Toney Douglas and Tony Wroten. Woolridge’s first taste of pro basketball in Greece saw him average 6.3 points, 3.2 rebounds and 1.4 assists across nine games.
Woolridge transferred to Gonzaga as a grad transfer from North Texas in June 2019. He had surgery shortly after his final season with the Green Machine to repair a stress fracture in his patella, an injury he suffered during the Conference USA tournament and one that required two screws in his leg. Woolridge was still ready to go by the 2019-20 season opener and claimed a spot in the starting lineup from day one, alongside Texas A&M transfer Admon Gilder in the backcourt.
The 2019-20 Bulldogs never got an opportunity to make a deep postseason run due to the COVID-19 pandemic, as many analysts and experts had the Zags projected to earn a No. 1 seed on Selection Sunday after going 31-2 and claiming the West Coast Conference Tournament championship over Saint Mary’s. Woolridge played a key role throughout with 10.1 points, 4.2 assists and 4.5 rebounds while logging over 32 minutes per game for Mark Few.
