2001–02 Euroleague Explained

Prevseason:	2000–01 2000–01 FIBA SuproLeague
Nextseason:	2002–03
Euroleague
Season:	2001–02
T Bg:	2A2D62; border:2px solid orange;
T Color:	white
Pixels:	300
Champions:	Panathinaikos (3rd title)
Runners Up:	Kinder Bologna
Teams:	32 (regular season) 41 (total)
Duration:	10 October 2001 – 12 May 2002
Award4:	Regular Season MVP
Award4 Winner:	Mirsad Türkcan
Award4 Link:	EuroLeague Regular Season and Top 16 MVP
Award4 N:	TUR
Award5:	Top 16 MVP
Award5 Link:	EuroLeague Regular Season and Top 16 MVP
Award5 N:	FRY
Award6:	Final Four MVP
Award6 Link:	EuroLeague Final Four MVP
Award6 N:	FRY
Pir:	25.8
Pir N:	TUR
Ppg:	24.8
Ppg N:	USA
Rpg:	12.8
Rpg N:	TUR
Apg:	5.3
Apg N:	USA

The 2001–02 Euroleague was the second season of the professional basketball competition for elite clubs throughout Europe, organised by Euroleague Basketball Company, and it was the 45th season of the premier competition for European men's clubs overall. The season started on October 10, 2001, and ended on May 5, 2002.

The Final Four was hosted in the PalaMalaguti in Bologna, Italy. A number of 32 teams competed for the championship, which was won by Panathinaikos.^[1] Mirsad Türkcan was named Regular season MVP, while Dejan Bodiroga was awarded EuroLeague Top 16 MVP and EuroLeague Final Four MVP.

Euroleague opening tournament

The 2001–02 season was the first run by ULEB and its company, the Euroleague Basketball, after FIBA Europe agreed that it would no longer organise Europe's top competition. Given that the previous season there were two main competitions, the 2000–01 FIBA Suproleague and the 2000–01 Euroleague, thus two European champions (Maccabi Tel Aviv and Kinder Bologna), it was decided that an opening tournament would be played to determine the unofficial champion. The Euroleague opening tournament was hosted in Ljubljana by Union Olimpija and was won by Cibona VIP, the only guest of the tournament, beating Maccabi Tel Aviv 78–67 in the final.^[2]

Competition system

• 41 teams in total with the qualification rounds, and 32 teams at the first group stage (the national domestic league champions from the best leagues, and a variable number of other clubs from the most important national domestic leagues), playing in a tournament system. The competition culminated in a Final Four.

Team allocation

Distribution

The table below shows the default access list.

	Teams entering in this round	Teams advancing from previous round
First qualifying round (6 teams)	The champion from Sweden The runners-up teams from: Germany Lithuania Slovenia The third-placed teams from: Croatia Turkey
Second qualifying round (8 teams)	The champion teams from: Portugal Switzerland The runners-up teams from: Belgium Israel The third-placed from France	3 winner teams from first qualifying round
Third qualifying round (4 teams)		4 winner teams from second qualifying round
Regular season (32 teams)	4 best-placed teams from: Greece Italy Spain 2 best-placed teams from: Croatia France Turkey Yugoslavia The champion teams from: Belgium Germany Israel Lithuania Poland Russia Slovenia 3 Wild Cards	2 winner teams from third qualifying round
Top 16 (16 teams)		4 group winners from the regular season 4 group runners-up from the regular season 4 group third-placed teams from the regular season 4 group fourth-placed teams from the regular season
Final Four (4 teams)		4 group winners from the top 16

Teams

The labels in the parentheses show how each team qualified for the place of its starting round (TH: EuroLeague title holders)

• 1st, 2nd, etc.: League position after Playoffs
• WC: Wild card

Regular season
width=210		width=210	Kinder Bologna^TH	width=210		width=210
width=210		width=210		width=210		width=210
width=210		width=210		width=210		width=210	Maccabi Elite^TH
width=210		width=210		width=210		width=210
width=210		width=210		width=210		width=210
width=210		width=210		width=210		width=210
width=210		width=210		width=210
width=210		width=210		width=210
Second qualifying round
width=210		width=210		width=210		width=210
width=210
First qualifying round
width=210		width=210		width=210		width=210
width=210		width=210

Qualifying rounds

First qualifying round

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Second qualifying round

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Third qualifying round

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Regular season

The first phase was a regular season, in which the competing teams were drawn into four groups, each containing eight teams. Each team played every other team in its group at home and away, resulting in 14 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:

1. Head-to-head record in matches between the tied clubs
2. Overall point difference in games between the tied clubs
3. Overall point difference in all group matches (first tiebreaker if tied clubs were not in the same group)
4. Points scored in all group matches
5. Sum of quotients of points scored and points allowed in each group match

Group A

Group B

Group C

Group D

Top 16

The remaining 16 teams were placed into four groups of four teams each. Each team played every other team in its group twice, once at home and once away. The top teams of each of the four groups advanced to the Final Four.

Group E

Group F

Group G

Group H

Final Four

See main article: 2002 Euroleague Final Four.

Awards

Round MVP

See main article: EuroLeague MVP of the Round.

Regular season

Week	Player	Team
1	Asım Pars	Ülker	39
2	Jaka Lakovič	Krka	55
3	Gregor Fučka	Skipper Bologna	37
4	Gregor Fučka (2)	Skipper Bologna	45
5			36
		Real Madrid
6	Valeri Daineko	Ural Great	40
7	Dimos Dikoudis	AEK	42
8	Andrius Giedraitis	Telindus Oostende	43
9	Ruslan Avleev	Ural Great	47
10	Mirsad Türkcan (2)	CSKA Moscow	43
11	Nikola Prkačin	Cibona VIP	41
12	Mirsad Türkcan (3)		34
		Spirou
13			36
		Union Olimpija
		ASVEL
14	Grigorij Khizhnyak (2)	Žalgiris	36

Top 16

Week	Player	Team
1	Ruslan Avleev (2)	Ural Great	42
2	Alphonso Ford	Olympiacos	29
3	Memo Okur	Efes Pilsen	36
4	Matjaž Smodiš	Kinder Bologna	38
5	Marcus Brown	Efes Pilsen	41
6	Mirsad Türkcan (4)	CSKA Moscow	34

Individual statistics

Rating

Rank	width=200	Name	width=200	Team	Games	width=75	Rating	width=40	PIR
1.	Mirsad Türkcan		17	439	25.82
2.	Joseph Blair		14	352	25.14
3.			14	351	25.07

Points

Rank	width=200	Name	width=200	Team	Games	width=75	Points	width=40	PPG
1.	Alphonso Ford		20	495	24.75
2.	Gordan Giriček	CSKA Moscow	18	413	22.94
3.	Jaka Lakovič		14	293	20.93

Rebounds

Rank	width=200	Name	width=200	Team	Games	width=75	Rebounds	width=40	RPG
1.	Mirsad Türkcan		17	217	12.76
2.	Joseph Blair		14	167	11.93
3.			14	137	9.79

Assists

Rank	width=200	Name	width=200	Team	Games	width=75	Assists	width=40	APG
1.	Elmer Bennett	Tau Cerámica	15	79	5.27
2.	Michael Hawkins		14	70	5.00
3.	John Celestand		13	62	4.77

Other statistics

width=125	Category	width=200	Player	width=200	Team	Games	Average
Steals			22	2.55
Blocks			14	3.21
Turnovers				14	3.71
Fouls drawn			14	7.14
Minutes			14	36:46
2P%			15	82.5%
3P%			14	56.1%
FT%			21	91.7%

Individual game highs

width=125	Category !	width=200	Player	width=200	Team	Statistic
PIR			55
	Points			40
Rebounds			23
Assists			12
Steals			7
Blocks			7
Three-pointers			7
Turnovers			8

See also

• 2001–02 FIBA Saporta Cup
• 2001–02 FIBA Korać Cup

Sources

• 2001-02 at Eurobasket.com
• Awards

External links

• Euroleague 2001/02 ULEB Euroleague 2001/02
• Euroleague.net – official Euroleague homepage

Notes and References

1. News: Final: Bodiroga leads Panathinaikos to European crown!. Euroleague.net. 27 February 2017.
2. News: Results Opening tournament 2001. https://web.archive.org/web/20020817144143/http://www.sportnet.hr/Stranica.asp?S=raspored&SPORT=kosarka&C=9&N=7&L=33. dead. 2002-08-17.