Astart the Basketball Champions League, kicks off the million euro tournament and does so with a renewed model and four Spaniards aspiring to be proclaimed champion of the sixth edition: the San Pablo Burgos, brand new champion and only two-time champion in history and also current champion of the Intercontinental Cup; the Lenovo Tenerife, the first champion of the palmars and a fixture in the Final Four; the Baxi Manresa, who returns to the European scene with great ambition; and a Unicaja determined to green European laurels that has not hesitated to park the Eurocup and the impossible access to the Euroleague betting on the BCL where sports meritocracy and the European model of sport prevail.
One million euros at stake
There is no competition that offers a better prize for the champion. And more so in times of Covid where teams have seen their collection capacity for tickets diminished. San Pablo Burgos, champion of the BCL consecutively in the last two editions, is a great example.
Calendar flexibility
In the last edition, the BCL demonstrated its flexibility and ability to adapt to new situations. In anticipation of the Covid effect, he modified the game system from 4 groups of 8 to 8 groups of four teams to be able to play every other week with rest. A decision that proved to be a success and a success seeking the well-being of the players compared to the initial punishment of 20-0 and a game lost by forfeit in the Euroleague.
Improved system: ‘Play in’ and every game counts
This year we continue to bet on the model of 8 groups of 4 teams with a novelty: the group champion qualifies directly for the Top16 while the second classified and the third will play a ‘play in’ similar to that of the NBA but with the best of three games to look for a ticket for the second phase. The second will have a field factor and the third, the option to qualify. In this way there will be excitement in every game until the end and every game will have enormous sporting value.
Monday Night Basketball
The concept of the game of the day is developed and is placed on Mondays with special media attention as happens in other major leagues such as the NFL. San Pablo Burgos, brand new bicampen, premieres the sports ‘prime time’ on Mondays at home in front of a reinforced Besiktas.
Maximum diversity and representation
The BCL has always defended the importance of sports meritocracy and the European sports model against the closed business of hermetic competitions such as the Euroleague in which not even the champions of the main leagues have a guaranteed place.
This edition has 32 teams in the Regular League from 19 different countries with 9 current national champions and another 15 who have been in previous years.
It should be noted that all the continental national champions who have requested to participate have obtained a direct place in the Regular Phase or an invitation to a previous round that was exciting with 24 teams from 24 different national leagues.
Defense of the National Leagues
The different National Leagues, the Endesa League among them, are participating partners in this competition and the harmony when planning, growing and adapting is total. The change in the competition system has been carried out hand in hand with the national leagues and the CEO of the BCL, Patrick Comninos, is blunt: “We collaborate closely with all the National Leagues. The priority of the participating teams must be their League. This is something that they understand and that they have appreciated on our part and a less loaded calendar allows them to focus on their domestic competitions ”
Rampaging in networks
The BCL is a reference competition in media exposure and impact on social networks thanks to the large quantity and high quality of the multimedia content offered (photos, spectacular videos, outstanding plays, summaries, specific actions) achieving a brutal ‘engagement’ with its fans. In the last edition there was a 6% increase in followers with more than 30 million videos viewed, reaching a total of 235 million fans spread across the planet.
An independent Final Four
Until now the venue of the Final Four or Final Eight was held at the home of one of the participants but this year it will not necessarily be so since it has become clear that the ‘product’ hooks, the following on social networks is brutal (3,2 million videos seen in the last edition and a total of 24.5 million followers) and the fans respond regardless of the host. Something that was already proven in the Final Four in Antwerp with Tenerife and Virtus in the grand final or in last year’s edition when Nizhny Novgorod, host, was eliminated in the first place.
In Search of Cinderella
The commitment to sports meritocracy in line with the closed model with licenses allows the appearance of great sports stories, something that hooks all fans. The magical year of Leicester in the Premier League has already been experienced in the Champions League with Sherrif Tiraspol, champion of Moldova and who leads his group ahead of Real Madrid, Inter and Shaktar.
In the BCL each year there have been excellent Cinderella-style irruptions such as Antwerp or San Pablo Burgos who proclaimed themselves champions, arriving directly from the previous phase. Be the Kalev Cramo, Estonian champion? Or the mythical Treviso squad classified from the qualifying round like the Romanian Cluj Napoca the Promethey of Ukraine?
The kings of marketing bet on the BCL
The Sportfive agency, which has reached a historic sponsorship agreement for the Lakers jersey above 180 million dollars and which collaborates, among others, with the Chicago Bulls, Atltico de Madrid, Chelsea, Borussia or Bayern in addition to the Committee. Olmpico Internacional, has partnered with the Basketball Champions League to maximize the impact of this growing competition.
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