2000–01 Euroleague

2000–01 Euroleague
The 2000–01 Euroleague was the inaugural basketball season of the EuroLeague, under ULEB and its newly formed Euroleague Basketball Company authority. Overall it was the 44th season of the premier competition for European men's professional basketball clubs overall. Initially not recognised or sanctioned by FIBA and considered a breakaway competition. It started on October 16, 2000, with a regular season game between hosts Real Madrid Teka and Olympiacos, which was held at the Raimundo Saporta Pavilion, in Madrid, Spain, and it ended with the last championship finals game on May 10, 2001, which was held at the PalaMalaguti arena, in Bologna, Italy.
This season did not feature all of the top-tier level European club basketball teams, as some of them opted to compete in the 2000–01 FIBA SuproLeague competition instead, after the row erupted between the previous EuroLeague governing body, FIBA, and the newly established Euroleague Basketball Company. It was the first time in European basketball that several clubs did not qualify to a European competition based on performance, but instead wild cards were given. Top clubs also signed licences with the right to participate in upcoming seasons regardless of their domestic league ranking.
A total of 24 teams competed for the EuroLeague title, which was in the end won by Kinder Bologna. Dejan Tomašević was the EuroLeague Regular season MVP, and Manu Ginóbili was the EuroLeague Finals MVP.
European Champions' Cup teams divided
The FIBA European Champions' Cup was originally established by FIBA and it operated under its umbrella from 1958 until the summer of 2000, concluding with the 1999–2000 season. Euroleague Basketball Company was created by ULEB clubs in 2000. At the time the leagues of ULEB were Spain, Italy, Greece, Belgium, Portugal, England and Switzerland. However against the will of their domestic leagues clubs from Lithuania, Croatia, Russia, Israel and Slovenia opted for the Euroleague competition despite the fact their leagues were not members of ULEB.
FIBA had never trademarked the "EuroLeague" name and had no legal recourse on the usage of that name, so they had to find a new name for their league. The following 2000–01 season started with two top European professional club basketball competitions: FIBA SuproLeague (renamed from the FIBA EuroLeague) and Euroleague.
Top clubs were split between the two leagues: Panathinaikos, Maccabi Elite Tel Aviv, CSKA Moscow, and Efes Pilsen stayed with FIBA, while Olympiacos, Kinder Bologna, Real Madrid, FC Barcelona, Tau Cerámica, and Benetton Treviso joined Euroleague Basketball. Lugano Tigers the Swiss champions were the last team to join the ULEB side and enter the competition.
Rules, format changes and dates
On 11 July 2000 in Thessaloniki during the ULEB Assembly format changes and dates were set for the new competition
The Official List of the teams will include a minimum of 12 and a maximum of 16 players. Ten players will be allowed on the bench while 2 USA players per team were permitted. There was no Final Four but a best of three series in the Final.
Andrea Bassani (ex-General Manager of the Italian League) was appointed in the Assembly as the Manager of Marketting and Media of the Euroleague.
Referees
Kostas Rigas was elected the commissioner. Three referees will officiate every Euroleague game. The team of Officials will be made up of 45 referees which signed guaranteed contracts for three years with no age restriction. However FIBA did not allow them to officiate in their domestic leagues in 2000-01.
Dates
Games will be played on Thursdays, with the possibility of moving them forward to Wednesday when necessary.
Regular season: 19 October 2000 to 8 January 2001
Play-offs 1/8 finals- 1,8,15 February 2001
Play-offs ¼ finals: 22 feb, 1, 8March 2001
Semi-finals: 27, 29 March, 3, 5, 12 April 2001
Finals: 17, 19 April, 1, 3, 10 May 2001
Team allocation
A total of 24 teams from 14 countries participate in the competition.
Distribution
The table below shows the default access list.
The competition culminated in a best 3 out of 5 playoff series.
Teams
The labels in the parentheses show how each team qualified for the place of its starting round
1st, 2nd, etc.: League position after Playoffs
WC: Wild card
Regular season
The first phase was a regular season, in which the competing teams were drawn into four groups, each containing six teams. Each team played every other team in its group at home and away, resulting in 10 games for each team in the first stage. The top 4 teams in each group advanced to the next round, The Top 16. The complete list of tiebreakers is provided in the lead-in to the Regular Season results.
If one or more clubs were level on won-lost record, tiebreakers were applied in the following order:
Head-to-head record in matches between the tied clubs
Overall point difference in games between the tied clubs
Overall point difference in all group matches (first tiebreaker if tied clubs were not in the same group)
Points scored in all group matches
Sum of quotients of points scored and points allowed in each group match
Group A
Source: Euroleague
Group B
Source: Euroleague
Group C
Source: Euroleague
Group D
Source: Euroleague
Playoffs
Bracket
Teams in bold advanced to the next round. The numbers to the left of each team indicate the team's seeding, the numbers to the right indicate the result of games including result in bold of the team that won in that game, and the numbers furthest to the right indicate the number of games the team won in that round.
<onlyinclude>
First Round
In a best-of-three series the remaining 16 teams were placed against each other. The games were held between the 31st of January and the 14th of February, 2001, with the top 8 teams advancing to the Playoffs.
|}
Quarterfinals
In a best-of-three series the remaining eight teams were placed against each other. The games were held between 21 February and 7 March 2001, with the top 4 teams advancing to the semifinals.
|}
Semifinals
In a best-of-five series the remaining four teams were placed against each other. The games were held between the 27th of March and the 7th of April, 2001.
Finals
The culminating stage of the Euroleague season, the two remaining teams that won the semifinal series played each other in a best-of-five series.
Awards
Top Scorer
Regular Season MVP
Finals MVP
Finals Top Scorer
All-Euroleague First Team
All-Euroleague Second Team
Round MVP
Regular season
Playoffs
Individual statistics
Rating
Points
Rebounds
Assists
Other statistics
Individual game highs
Aftermath
In May 2001, Europe had two continental champions, Maccabi Tel Aviv of the FIBA SuproLeague and Kinder Bologna of Euroleague Basketball Company's EuroLeague. The leaders of both organizations realized the need to come up with a new single competition. Negotiating from the position of strength ULEB dictated proceedings, and FIBA essentially had no choice but to agree to their terms. As a result, the EuroLeague was fully integrated under Euroleague Basketball Company's umbrella, and teams that competed in the FIBA SuproLeague during the 2000–01 season joined it as well. It is today officially admitted that European basketball had two champions that year, Maccabi of the FIBA SuproLeague and Kinder Bologna of the Euroleague Basketball Company's EuroLeague.
A year later, Euroleague Basketball Company and FIBA decided that Euroleague Basketball's EuroLeague competition would be the main basketball tournament on the continent, to be played between the top level teams of Europe. FIBA Europe would also organize a European league for third-tier level teams, known as the FIBA Europe League competition, while Euroleague Basketball would also organize its own second-tier level league, combining FIBA's long-time Korać Cup and Saporta Cup competitions into one new competition, the EuroCup. In 2005, Euroleague Basketball and FIBA decided to cooperate with each other, and did so jointly until 2016.
In essence, the authority in European professional basketball was divided over club-country lines. FIBA stayed in charge of national team competitions (like the FIBA EuroBasket, the FIBA World Cup, and the Summer Olympics), while Euroleague Basketball took over the European professional club competitions. From that point on, FIBA's Korać Cup and Saporta Cup competitions lasted only one more season before folding and merged to the FIBA Europe Champions Cup in 2002 which was when Euroleague Basketball launched the ULEB Cup.
See also
2000–01 FIBA SuproLeague
2000–01 FIBA Saporta Cup
2000–01 FIBA Korać Cup
References and notes
Sources
2000-01 at Eurobasket.com
Results
External links
2000–01 Euroleague
2000–01 Euroleague
Eurobasket.com 2000–01 Euroleague
EuroLeague seasons