ALBA BERLIN enters its 21st season with a newly formed team but with the same goals of winning titles on the national and international level as well as offering its fans high-level sport and entertainment each time the team steps on the court, in order to attract even more fans to this fascinating game. With this in mind, we wish you exciting and attractive basketball events with our team in one of Europe’s most beautiful arenas, the Berlin o2 World!

ALBA BERLIN is participating in the German National League "Beko Basketball Bundesliga" and in the "Eurocup" on European Level.


Like last season, ALBA will be playing on the European level in the Europcup this year. After reaching the finals last year, which marked the highest level of success for a German team to date in the second highest European competition, the Berliners enter the season with growing expectations and are pushed by some into a favorite’s roll. Nevertheless, the fact remains that ALBA is one of 32 teams fighting for a common goal with more or less the same chances.

The Eurocup is the direct successor of the ULEP Cup (founded in the 2002/03 season), in which ALBA competed from 2004- 2008. The name change of the competition is based on a contract between the Union of European Basketball Leagues (ULEP) and the European section of the FIBA alliance (Federation of International Basketball) in which both sides settled on a solution of their fight over European Club Competition. The contract states that the ULEP is responsible for the organization of both the Euroleague and Eurocup competitions. FIBA held the sole rights for both the “European Cup of the Cup Winners”(founded in 1966) and later the second highest competition, the Europa Cup (also Saporta Cup) until the 2001/2002 season.

The signing of this contract marked the return of transparency to European basketball, in which, much like the heyday of club play in the second half of the nineties (with the European league, the Saporta Cup and the Korac Cup), the participating clubs are divided into three main competitions: 2 top competitive leagues, Euroleage (24 participating teams) and the Eurocup (32 participating teams), as well as a third competition, the “EuroChallange”, which is organized by the FIBA (32 participating teams). The two finalists of the EuroChallange advance in the next season to the Eurocup, and the winner of the Eurocup earns a start in the Euroleague.


The Beko Basketball Bundesliga looks back at the last season as its most successful to date, after strategically strengthening the league through the addition of the partner, Sport 1. The number of spectators in the Beko BBL rose again, reaching a total of 1,302,350 fans at 335 games in the 2009/2010 season. With a 3,888 fans per game average, the Beko BBL is in second place in Europe behind only the Spanish ACB League. The results on the international playing floor were also better than ever before, with ALBA reaching the finals of the second highest European competition (Eurocup), and BG Göttingen winning the third highest competition (EuroChallange).

In this new season, marking the 45th start of the German basketball league since 1966 when it entered its first season as the Deutschen Basketball Bund (DBB), and the 10th season as a self-ruling league, the Beko BBL is looking to continue building on its successes. The league is applying special attention to the development of youth and young players. Along with the Nachwuchs Basketball Bundesliga (youth Basketball League for players 19 or younger)), or NBBL, which was founded in 2006 with cooperation between the DBB and the AG 2nd Basketball Bundesliga, the Youth Basketball Bundesliga (for players 16 and younger), or JBBL was formed as well in the past season. In the coming season, the youth leagues are supported by new measures demanding more German players in the first league. Each Bundesliga team that has 10 or 11 players must have 4 German players, and the teams with 12 players must have at least 5 Germans on the roster. This new rule should give the youth players in Germany more perspective and help fortify their hopes of being able to play in the top German league as professional basketball players.

However, what remains in the foreground is, of course, the goal of offering the fans in the arenas and watching on TV dramatic and entertaining basketball. For this, the league does not even need to offer such capers as in the last season, when all four of the top teams did not make it to the second round of the playoffs. From the first game on, the overwhelming balance of the league, which has made it difficult for any team to repeat as champion, only allowing one repeat since 2003 when ALBA defended its title, will offer the fans spectacular and exciting basketball.