basketball
Niners Chemnitz win European Cup
The Niners Chemnitz won the first title in their club history. photo
© Matthias Stickel/dpa
Chemnitz wins the FIBA Europe Cup despite a second leg defeat against Bahcesehir. The club is the sixth German basketball team with a European title.
The Niners Chemnitz celebrated the greatest success in their club history and won the FIBA Europe Cup.
The basketball Bundesliga team lost the second leg of the final at Bahcesehir College 95:105 (38:55) after extra time, but won the first leg last week with 85:74. This eleven-point cushion was enough for Chemnitz to win the title. Kaza Kajami-Keane led the Saxons with 29 points.
After Alba Berlin (1993), the Syntainics MBC from Weißenfels (2004), the BG Göttingen (2010), the Fraport Skyliners from Frankfurt (2016) and the Telekom Baskets Bonn (2023), the Chemnitz club is the sixth German team to have one European Cup wins. The FIBA Europe Cup is the weakest of the four current European basketball competitions.
The Chemnitz team led 19:18 after the first quarter, but lost their rhythm in the second half. Bahcesehir, on the other hand, now hit his threes and went ahead with an 18:4 run to take the lead to 55:38 at the break. The guests had to accept 37 points in the second half.
Kajami-Keane turns up the heat after the break
After the break, Chemnitz was better defensively with a zone defense. Kaza Kajami-Keane also turned things up on the offensive. The playmaker scored 14 points in the third period and made it 67:67. The guests dominated the third quarter with 29:12. In the fourth round, the Niners had to let things slip further and further, with eight seconds before the end of the game the hosts took the lead with 95:84. After Chemnitz’s eleven-point win in the first leg, the game went into extra time.
There the guests had to do without the fourth player of their big guard, who was no longer allowed to play after five fouls. Nevertheless, the Chemnitz team managed to keep their deficit from growing to more than ten points. In the last attack of the game, Bahcesehir missed a three-pointer that would have won the title for the Turks.