Baltic Basketball League 24
Top 100 teams in Europe: Week of upsets edition
While NBA fans were mostly talking about Blake Griffin and Carmelo Anthony last week, the buzzword around Europe last week was “upset.” Seemingly from end to end, Continental leagues saw their respective mighty – if not fall – at least stagger from a blow dealt by a lower seed. Real Madrid lost to new no. […]
Lietuvos Rytas Dance Team displays sweet routine
For those of you with Facebook accounts, drop everything you’re doing immediately (or perhaps after you get to the end of this post) and check out the Baltic Basketball League page for what could well be the coolest-ever number performed by a basketball dance team. Therein, the Lietuvos Rytas ladies are not only wearing some […]
Top 100 Teams in Europe: Pre-Cups Running Over Edition
As most European domestic leagues are taking a break for a week or two for national cup and/or all-star festivities, BallinEurope crunches the numbers again to determine where the Continent’s finest stand. Near the top, Maccabi Tel Aviv’s Euroleague-side punishment of Union Olimpija shook things up a bit within the top 10 and Olympiacos reasserted […]
Top 100 Teams in Europe: Tops in ACB tops on Continent
The changes begin near the top in this week’s edition of the BallinEurope Top 100 Teams list, as Montepaschi’s third consecutive Euroleague loss dumps the Italian side down to no. 3, passed by their most recent vanquisher, Real Madrid. The top 20 stays fairly stable thereafter, with some jostling of position but no seismic shifts. […]
The Top 100 Teams in Europe: Calm before the storm edition
All right, another Thursday means another look at BallinEurope’s Top 100 Teams in Europe chart, the last until the big pan-Continental leagues gear up again with sweet 16 action. (BiE was just waiting for the dust to settle in Athens after the PAO-Olympiacos match, but settling may yet be a few days in the making.) […]
Introducing the ultimate BiE rankings: The Top 100 basketball teams in Europe
In gearing up to produce another official BallinEurope Euroleague Power Rankings column (it’ll be up here after the draw next week), BiE got to thinking about how unsatisfying the task will be with only 16 teams remaining. After all, BiE regularly has an eye on hundreds of teams and though the Euroleague is clearly cream-of-the-Continental-Crop, […]
A brief YouTube history of Žalgiris Kaunas vs. Lietuvos Rytas
Friday will see the Baltic Basketball League final four tip off, while the Lithuanian Basketball League starts up its own domestic tournament next Wednesday, April 28. At this point, both seem once again inevitably headed to a final confrontation of those superpowers of Lithuanian ‘ball, namely Žalgiris Kaunas and Lietuvos Rytas. In the BBL, the […]
State of the nations: European basketball organizations today
While not interested in passing definitive judgment, we think it would be useful and fair to take a look at the European basketball panorama. There will be no ratings or rankings here, just a snapshot of what the most important ballin’ countries offer us. Ten years into the third millennium, it’s common to hear repeated […]
European Basketball Calendar: February 2010 (first half)
And now for the public-service portion of Ball in Europe … at no cost to you runs a somewhat comprehensive of the basketball action going down for the first two weeks of February; schedule information is provided for top leagues in Spain, France, Germany, and Italy, together with international leagues and FIBA competitions. This calendar […]
European basketball calendar: January 2010
Emerging from the holiday season, we happily find a month packed with wall-to-wall basketball on The Continent. Below is a partial calendar filled with listings for matchups in a handful of Europe’s larger domestic leagues and international club competitions for men and women. We’ll post updated versions of this schedule as time allows and blanks […]
FIBA EuroChallenge capsule previews: Group G
In the seventh of eight groups competing in FIBA EuroChallenge 2009-10 play — Group G — facing off are formidable programs and traditional tournament contenders from Antwerp, Artland, Tartu and Wels. Briefs follow the break.
Interview: Ten minutes with Romualdas Brazauskas
In every single professional basketball game ever played, one team on the floor goes full bore the whole time the clock is running, yet is invisible. In fact, the team that plays this way best serves the fans by remaining absolute unknowns and making as little perceptible impact on the match as possible. We’re talking […]