Baltic Basketball League

Baltic Basketball League
Sport	Basketball
Founded	2004
Ceased	2018
No. of teams	14
Country	Estonia; Latvia; Lithuania
Continent	Europe
Last; champion(s)	Pieno žvaigždės; (1st title)
Most titles	Žalgiris Kaunas; (5 titles)
TV partner(s)	Viasat Sport Baltic
Official website	bbl.net

Baltic Basketball League (BBL) was the Baltic states basketball league founded in 2004. The league mainly focused on teams from the Baltic states, but teams from Sweden, Russia, Kazakhstan, Finland, and Belarus have participated in the Baltic League. After the 2017–18 season, the league announced that it was suspending its operations.^[1]

History

For the 2015–16 season, the format of the BBL included a regular season composed by two groups of seven teams that competed in a round-robin competition system, with each team facing their opponent twice. The teams qualified for the eight-finals based on their ranking after the regular season. Out of the five teams who participated in FIBA Europe Cup competition – Ventspils, Juventus, Šiauliai, Tartu Ülikool/Rock and Pieno žvaigždės – the latter three did not qualify for the FIBA Europe Cup playoffs and thus started playing at the start of the BBL playoffs, seeded respectively first, second and third based on last season's results.^[2] All play-off games are played in home-and-away series.

Baltic Basketball League also featured a Baltic Basketball League Cup competition before the beginning of the regular season since 2008.

Teams

These are the teams that participated in 2017–18 season:

Group	Team	City, Country	Arena	Head coach
Group A	AVIS Rapla	Rapla, Estonia	Sadolin Sports Hall	Aivar Kuusmaa
	Pärnu Sadam	Pärnu, Estonia	Pärnu Sports Hall	Heiko Rannula
	Betsafe/Liepāja	Liepāja, Latvia	Liepāja Olympic Center	Agris Galvanovskis
	Jūrmala	Jūrmala, Latvia	Jūrmala State Gymnasium	Mārtiņš Gulbis
	Šiauliai	Šiauliai, Lithuania	Šiauliai Arena	Antanas Sireika
	Vytautas	Prienai/Birštonas, Lithuania	Prienai Arena	Virginijus Šeškus
	Tsmoki-Minsk II	Minsk, Belarus	The team will play away	Rostislav Vergun
Group B	University of Tartu	Tartu, Estonia	University of Tartu Sports Hall	Priit Vene
	TLÜ/Kalev	Tallinn, Estonia	Kalev Sports Hall	Gert Kullamäe
	TTÜ	Tallinn, Estonia	TTÜ Sports Hall	Rait Käbin
	Valmiera/ORDO	Valmiera, Latvia	Vidzeme Olympic Center	Kristaps Valters
	Ogre	Ogre, Latvia	Ogre 1st Secondary School	Arturs Visockis-Rubenis
	Pieno žvaigždės	Pasvalys, Lithuania	Pieno žvaigždės Arena	Gediminas Petrauskas
	Barsy Atyrau	Atyrau, Kazakhstan	The team will play away	Aleksandar Vrzina

Baltic League champions

Elite Division champions

Season	Champion	Runner Up	1st leg	2nd leg	Host City
2004–05	Žalgiris Kaunas	Lietuvos rytas	64–60	–	Vilnius
2005–06	Lietuvos rytas	Žalgiris Kaunas	86–74	–	Tallinn
2006–07	Lietuvos rytas	Žalgiris Kaunas	81–77	–	Rīga
2007–08	Žalgiris Kaunas	Lietuvos rytas	86–84	–	Šiauliai
2008–09	Lietuvos rytas	Žalgiris Kaunas	97–74	–	Tartu
2009–10	Žalgiris Kaunas	Lietuvos rytas	73–66	–	Vilnius
2010–11	Žalgiris Kaunas	VEF Rīga	75–67	–	Kaunas
2011–12	Žalgiris Kaunas	Lietuvos rytas	74–70	–	Šiauliai
2012–13	Ventspils	Prienai	91–69	70–73	Prienai & Ventspils
2013–14	Šiauliai	Prienai	62–57	78–66	Prienai & Šiauliai
2014–15	Šiauliai	Ventspils	68–70	88–80	Ventspils & Šiauliai
2015–16	Šiauliai	Tartu Ülikool/Rock	74–81	102–76	Tartu & Šiauliai
2016–17	Vytautas	Pieno žvaigždės	85–88	89–74	Prienai & Pasvalys
2017–18	Pieno žvaigždės	Jūrmala	98–80	76–68	Jūrmala & Pasvalys

Challenge Cup champions

Season	Champion	Runner Up	1st leg	2nd leg	Host City
2004–05	Panevėžys	Bumerangs/Gulbene/ASK	87–74	–	Panevėžys
2007–08	Nevėžis	VEF Rīga	81–68	–	Rīga
2008–09	Sakalai	VEF Rīga	84–77	–	Utena
2009–10	Norrköping Dolphins	Rūdupis	77–87	107–72	Prienai & Norrköping
2010–11	Juventus	KK Kaunas	87–81	89–72	Kaunas & Utena
2011–12	Lietkabelis	Rakvere Tarvas	89–74	71–82	Rakvere & Panevėžys

BBL Cup winners

Season	Winner	Finalist	Score	Host City
2008	Lietuvos rytas	Barons/LMT	80–78	Rīga
2009	Žalgiris Kaunas	Lietuvos rytas	83–78	Kaunas
2010	Tartu Ülikool/Rock	Lietuvos rytas	61–57	Tartu
2011	VEF Rīga	Tartu Ülikool	95–69	Tartu
2012	Rakvere Tarvas	Liepāja/Triobet	80–71	Rakvere
2013	Nevėžis	Tartu Ülikool/Rock	82–64	Kėdainiai
2014	Liepāja/Triobet	Tartu Ülikool/Rock	74–61	Liepāja
2015	Not held
2016	Valmiera/ORDO	Ventspils	66–64	Valmiera
2017	Not held

Baltic League awards

Regular season MVP

Season	Player	Team
2004–05	Tanoka Beard	Žalgiris Kaunas
2005–06	Darjuš Lavrinovič	Žalgiris Kaunas
2006–07	Travis Reed	Kalev/Cramo
2007–08	Vladimir Štimac	Valmiera
2008–09	Paulius Jankūnas	Žalgiris Kaunas
2009–10	Alex Renfroe	VEF Rīga
2010–11	Artsiom Parakhouski	VEF Rīga
2011–12	Valdas Vasylius	Šiauliai
2012–13	Gediminas Orelik	Prienai
2013–14	Travis Leslie	Šiauliai

Finals MVP

Season	Player	Team
2004–05	Tanoka Beard	Žalgiris Kaunas
2005–06	Fred House	Lietuvos rytas
2006–07	Kareem Rush	Lietuvos rytas
2007–08	DeJuan Collins	Žalgiris Kaunas
2008–09	Chuck Eidson	Lietuvos rytas
2009–10	Marcus Brown	Žalgiris Kaunas
2010–11	Tadas Klimavičius	Žalgiris Kaunas
2011–12	Mantas Kalnietis	Žalgiris Kaunas
2012–13	Jānis Timma	Ventspils
2013–14	Travis Leslie	Šiauliai
2014–15	Gintaras Leonavičius	Šiauliai
2015–16	Rokas Giedraitis	Šiauliai
2016–17	Tomas Delininkaitis	Vytautas
2017–18	Jahenns Manigat	Pieno žvaigždės

Statistical leaders

Statistics include regular season and play-off games

Points per game

2004–05 Jason Coleman (neptunas): 25.00 (in 14 games)
2005–06 Akselis Vairogs (Valmiera): 20.90 (in 31 games)
2006–07 Travis Reed (Kalev/Cramo): 19.93 (in 29 games)
2007–08 Travis Reed (Kalev/Cramo): 17.39 (in 18 games)
2008–09 Ingus Bankevics (Valmiera): 19.61 (in 18 games)
2009–10 - Josh Akognon (Kalev/Cramo): 19.53 (in 15 games)
2010–11 Bambale Osby (TTÜ/Kalev): 18.64 (in 22 games)
2011–12 Denzel Bowles (Šiauliai): 19.33 (in 12 games)
2012–13 Reimo Tamm (Rakvere Tarvas): 18.06 (in 18 games)
2013–14 Jānis Kaufmanis (Valmiera): 19.50 (in 14 games)
2014–15 Brandis Raley-Ross (Rakvere Tarvas): 21.18 (in 11 games)
2015–16 Andrew Warren (Pärnu Sadam): 25.57 (in 7 games)
2016–17 Trevin Parks (Barsy Atyrau): 21.57 (in 14 games)
2017–18 Yauheni Beliankou (Tsmoki-Minsk II): 18.40 (in 10 games)

Rebounds per game

2004–05 Duke Freeman-McKamey (Panevėžys): 13.22 (in 9 games)
2005–06 Darjuš Lavrinovič (Žalgiris): 9.87 (in 31 games)
2006–07 A. J. Bramlett (ASK Rīga): 8.38 (in 21 games)
2007–08 Vladimir Štimac (Valmiera): 10.95 (in 20 games)
2008–09 Tanoka Beard (Tartu Ülikool/Rock): 9.26 (in 23 games)
2009–10 Alex Renfroe (VEF Rīga): 7.24 (in 21 games)
2010–11 Bambale Osby (TTÜ/Kalev): 11.95 (in 22 games)
2011–12 David James McClure (Kedainiai/Triobet): 9.28 (in 18 games)
2012–13 Tyler Cain (Barons kvartāls): 11.43 (in 14 games)
2013–14 Joakim Kjellbom (Norrköping Dolphins): 9.69 (in 16 games)
2014–15 Ronaldas Rutkauskas (KK Pärnu): 10.44 (in 9 games)
2015–16 Stephan Zack (Liepaja/Triobet): 11.00 (in 12 games)
2016–17 Thomas van der Mars (AVIS Rapla): 11.43 (in 14 games)
2017–18 Viktors Iļjins (Valmiera ORDO): 11.00 (in 11 games)

Assists per game

2004–05 Raimonds Gabrāns (Bumerangs/Gulbene/ASK): 6.38 (in 16 games)
2005–06 Raimonds Gabrāns (Bumerangs/Gulbene/ASK): 5.19 (in 32 games)
2006–07 Tomas Gaidamavičius (Panevėžys): 4.58 (in 24 games)
2007–08 Curtis Nash (Valmiera): 4.18 (in 11 games)
2008–09 Giorgi Tsintsadze (Tartu Ülikool/Rock): 5.09 (in 23 games)
2009–10 Charron Fisher (Kalev/Cramo): 8.79 (in 14 games)
2010–11 Evaldas Dainys (Rūdupis): 5.25 (in 16 games)
2011–12 Rashaun Broadus (Šiauliai): 4.39 (in 23 games)
2012–13 Augustas Pečiukevičius (KK Pärnu): 5.71 (in 14 games)
2013–14 Rinalds Sirsniņš (Jēkabpils): 4.83 (in 12 games)
2014–15 Nikos Gkikas (Ventspils): 5.88 (in 8 games)
2015–16 Rait-Riivo Laane (TTÜ KK): 6.58 (in 12 games)
2016–17 Toni Prostran (Nevėžis): 9.33 (in 15 games)
2017–18 Donatas Sabeckis (Šiauliai): 6.88 (in 16 games)

References

^ Urbonas, Donatas (13 June 2018). "Merdėjantis BBL turnyras stabdomas, LKL mąsto apie naują lygą". LRT.lt (in Lithuanian). Retrieved 9 August 2018.
^ "Triobet BBL Play-Off pairs confirmed". Baltic Basketball League. February 3, 2016.

External links

[1] Urbonas, Donatas (13 June 2018). "Merdėjantis BBL turnyras stabdomas, LKL mąsto apie naują lygą". LRT.lt (in Lithuanian). Retrieved 9 August 2018.

[2] "Triobet BBL Play-Off pairs confirmed". Baltic Basketball League. February 3, 2016.

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