2018–19 FIBA Europe Cup

FIBA Europe Cup
Competition details
Season	2018–19
Teams	32 (regular season)
Dates	20 September – 10 October 2018 (qualifying rounds); 17 October 2018 – 1 May 2019 (competition proper)
	← 2017–18 2019–20 →

The 2018–19 FIBA Europe Cup is the fourth season of the FIBA Europe Cup, considered the fourth-tier European professional basketball competition for clubs, that was launched by FIBA. The competition began on 20 September 2018, with the qualifying rounds, and will conclude on 1 May 2019.

Team allocation

Teams

The labels in the parentheses show how each team qualified for the place of its starting round:^[1]^[2]

1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc.: League position after eventual Playoffs
CL: Transferred from Champions League
- RS: Fifth-placed and sixth-placed teams from regular season
- QR: Losers from qualifying rounds

Play-offs
(CL RS)	(CL RS)	(CL RS)	(CL RS)
(CL RS)	(CL RS)	(CL RS)	(CL RS)
Regular season
Belfius Mons-Hainaut (5th)	~~Karhu~~ (CL QR3)	~~Movistar Estudiantes~~ (CL QR2)	~~Šiauliai~~ (CL QR1)
s.Oliver Würzburg (9th)	~~Polski Cukier Toruń~~ (CL QR3)	Tsmoki-Minsk (CL QR1)	Porto (CL QR1)
Falco Vulcano (2nd)	Sakarya Büyükşehir (CL QR3)	Petrolina AEK Larnaca (CL QR1)	Oradea (CL QR1)
Openjobmetis Varese (6th)	Lukoil Levski (CL QR2)	~~Dinamo Tbilisi~~ (CL QR1)	Avtodor Saratov (CL QR1)
Steaua CSM EximBank (2nd)	Bakken Bears (CL QR2)	Leicester Riders (CL QR1)	~~Norrköping Dolphins~~ (CL QR1)
Pınar Karşıyaka (10th)	Aris (CL QR2)	Szolnoki Olaj (CL QR1)
Spirou (CL QR3)	~~Red October Cantù~~ (CL QR2)	~~Hapoel SP Tel Aviv~~ (CL QR1)
JIP Pardubice (CL QR3)	Donar (CL QR2)	Z-Mobile Prishtina (CL QR1)
Second qualifying round
Balkan (2nd)	New Heroes Den Bosch (5th)	Alba Fehérvár (3rd)	U-BT Cluj-Napoca (3rd)
Rilski Sportist (3rd)	ece Bulls Kapfenberg (1st)	Dinamo Sassari (10th)	Luleå (2nd)
ZZ Leiden (2nd)	Keravnos (2nd)	Benfica (3rd)
First qualifying round
Cherkaski Mavpy (1st)	Kataja (6th)	Kongsberg Miners (1st)	İstanbul BB (11th)
Dnipro (2nd)	Lavrio Megabolt (6th)	Rosa Radom (5th)
Dekstone Tuři Svitavy (4th)	Ironi Nes Ziona (8th)	Södertälje Kings (3rd)

Round and draw dates

The draw will take place on the 31 July 2018 in the FIBA headquarters in Munich, Germany. The schedule of the competition is as follows (all draws are held at the FIBA headquarters in Munich, Germany, unless stated otherwise):^[2]

Phase	Round	Draw date	First leg	Second leg
Qualifying rounds	First qualifying round	31 July 2018	20–21 September 2018	26 September 2018
Qualifying rounds	Second qualifying round		3 October 2018	10 October 2018
Regular season	Matchday 1		17 October 2018
	Matchday 2		24 October 2018
	Matchday 3		31 October 2018
	Matchday 4		7 November 2018
	Matchday 5		14 November 2018
	Matchday 6		21 November 2018
Second round	Matchday 1		12 December 2018
	Matchday 2		19 December 2018
	Matchday 3		9 January 2019
	Matchday 4		23 January 2019
	Matchday 5		30 January 2019
	Matchday 6		6 February 2019
Play-offs	Round of 16	TBC	6 March 2019	13 March 2019
	Quarter-finals		20 March 2019	27 March 2019
	Semi-finals		10 April 2019	17 April 2019
	Finals		24 April 2019	1 May 2019

Qualifying rounds

The draw for the qualifying rounds was held on 31 July 2018 at the FIBA headquarters in Munich, Germany.

In the qualifying rounds, teams are divided into seeded and unseeded teams based on their club coefficients, and then drawn into two-legged home-and-away ties. Teams from the same country cannot be drawn against each other.

First qualifying round

A total of 10 teams played in the first qualifying round. The first legs were played on 20 and 21 September, and the second legs were played on 26 September 2018.

Team 1	Agg.	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Lavrio Megabolt	140–149	Dnipro	82–73	58–76
Kongsberg Miners	153–184	Cherkaski Mavpy	63–83	90–101
Ironi Nes Ziona	172–143	Södertälje Kings	72–67	100–76
Kataja	161–134	Rosa Radom	86–65	75–69
Dekstone Tuři Svitavy	152–197	İstanbul BB	74–99	78–98

Second qualifying round

A total of 16 teams will play in the second qualifying round: 11 teams which enter in this round, and the 5 winners of the first qualifying round. The first legs were played on 3 October, and the second legs will be played on 10 October 2018.

Team 1	Agg.	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Cherkaski Mavpy	136–128	Keravnos	75–64	61–64
Dnipro	161–168	Alba Fehérvár	94–78	67–90
ece Bulls Kapfenberg	119–147	ZZ Leiden	62–79	57–68
Kataja	167–163	Rilski Sportist	106–84	61–79
New Heroes Den Bosch	144–152	Balkan	76–86	68–66
Ironi Nes Ziona	179–167	U-BT Cluj-Napoca	91–78	88–89
İstanbul BB	160–128	Luleå	87–50	73–78
Dinamo Sassari	211–158	Benfica	100–66	111–92

Notes

^ Order of legs reversed after original draw.

Lucky losers table

Three teams would advance as lucky losers of the qualifying rounds, for replacing teams that qualified for the Basketball Champions League regular season and previously confirmed their intention to join the FIBA Europe Cup if they were eliminated in the qualifying rounds. Teams with the smallest point difference in the second qualifying round advanced to the regular season. A draw to determine the groups for the clubs qualified as the best-ranked losing sides will be held in the FIBA Europe office in Munich on 11 October 2018.

Ranked third among the lucky losers, Den Bosch clipped the fourth-ranked Keravnos due to a higher number of points scored, with the teams tied in point differential.^[3]

Pos	Team	Pld	W	L	PF	PA	PD	Qualification
1	Rilski Sportist	2	1	1	163	167	−4	Advance to regular season
2	Dnipro	2	1	1	161	168	−7
3	New Heroes Den Bosch	2	1	1	144	152	−8
4	Keravnos	2	1	1	128	136	−8
5	U-BT Cluj-Napoca	2	1	1	167	179	−12
6	ece Bulls Kapfenberg	2	0	2	119	147	−28
7	Luleå	2	1	1	128	160	−32
8	Benfica	2	0	2	158	211	−53

Source: FIBA Europe Cup
Rules for classification: 1) Least point difference; 2) Points for.

Regular season

Location of teams of the 2018–19 FIBA Europe Cup regular season.

Red: Group A;

Yellow: Group B;

Green: Group C;

Dark Green: Group D;

Purple: Group E.

Pink: Group F;

Blue: Group G;

Orange: Group H.

The draw for the regular season was held on 31 July 2018 at the FIBA headquarters in Munich, Germany.

The 32 teams are drawn into eight groups of four, a maximum of two clubs from the same country can be in the same group. In each group, teams play against each other home-and-away in a round-robin format. The group winners and runners-up advance to the second round, while the third-placed teams and fourth-placed teams are eliminated.

The following 10 teams chose the option of ending their continental adventure if they were eliminated from the Champions League qualifying rounds and therefore refuse to participate in the FIBA Europe Cup:

Opt-out clause teams

Notes:

Strikethrough teams were eliminated from the Basketball Champions League qualifying rounds and refused to participate in the FIBA Europe Cup.
Teams marked in italics advanced to the Basketball Champions League regular season.

A total of 32 teams play in the regular season: the six teams directly qualified, the eight winners of the second qualifying round, the 15 of 23 losers of the 2018–19 Champions League qualifying rounds and three lucky losers of the second qualifying round.

Depending on the number of teams mentioned above that were eliminated from the Basketball Champions League qualifying rounds and with the aim to complete the 32 places in the regular season, the number of the defeated teams in the second qualifying round of the FIBA Europe Cup that advanced to the regular season were determined by the point difference recorded at the end of their pairings. In their draw, the first qualifying round was used for tie-breaking. In the draw persists, the next criteria was the performance of clubs in the last three seasons at the European competitions.^[4]

The match-days are on 17 October, 24 October, 31 October, 7 November, 14 November and 21 November 2018.