After spending just one season at Panathinaikos, Greek guard Vassilis Toliopoulos has left Athens and officially joined Aris.
Vassilis Toliopoulos has played for Greece’s four biggest clubs – Panathinaikos, Olympiacos, PAOK, and Aris – and this signing marks his return to the yellow-and-black side of Thessaloniki, where he previously played in 2019, as well as from 2022 to 2025.
“Now it feels like home”
Aris paid Panathinaikos over one million euros for his services, while Toliopoulos left Athens after just one year of his three-year contract with the “Greens.”
“I am very happy to have returned to both Aris and Thessaloniki. Now Aris feels like home. It is the team I have spent the most years with, the people I have bonded with the most, so I really feel very familiar and at home,” the Greek guard said, adding:
“Things are completely different in the team compared to the previous years when I was here in 2019 and the previous three years. The team climbs many steps each year compared to the level it is at in all areas. I am happy to be here again to experience this new course of the team, in the new era that has entered, everything will be easier. We will definitely be more competitive in the two championships that we compete in.”
The Spanoulis factor
At Aris, he will now work with head coach Vassilis Spanoulis, whom he knows from the Greek national team.
“Coach Spanoulis and I both know that we had an excellent collaboration in the National Team. I know that he is a very fair coach and he wants to win, and so do I. So, I expect and I am sure that we will have an excellent collaboration.”
A loaded roster for a new era
Aris has made a large number of roster changes this summer, becoming one of the top favorites to win the EuroCup and earn a subsequent spot in the EuroLeague.
In addition to Vassilis Toliopoulos, the club previously brought in Stefan Jovic, Jeremiah Robinson-Earl, Nenad Dimitrijevic, Kostas Antetokounmpo, and Khem Birch.
