The 1996–97 FIBA EuroLeague was the 40th installment of the European top-tier level professional club competition for

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appro ...

clubs (now called simply

EuroLeague The EuroLeague is a European men's professional basketball club competition. The league is widely recognised as the top-tier and the most prestigious men's basketball league in Europe. The league consists of 20 teams, of which 16 are given lon ...

). It was organized by

FIBA Europe FIBA Europe is the administrative body for basketball in Europe, within the FIBA, International Basketball Federation (FIBA), which includes all List of men's national basketball teams#FIBA Europe, 50 national European basketball federations. ...

. It began on September 19, 1996, and ended on April 24, 1997. The competition's Final Four was held at

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

. In the previous 5 seasons of the competition, the competition's official name was FIBA European League, or shortened to FIBA EuroLeague. This season was the first edition of the competition that took the shortened name of FIBA EuroLeague, as the league's official name.

Competition system

*24 teams (the national domestic league champions from the best leagues, and a variable number of other clubs from the most important national domestic leagues). The competition culminated in a Final Four.

Country ranking

For the 1996–1997 EuroLeague, the countries are allocated places according to their place on the FIBA country rankings, which takes into account their performance in European competitions from 1993–94 to 1995–96.

Team allocation

The labels in the parentheses show how each team qualified for the place of its starting round: * 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc.: League position after Playoffs

Preliminary round

Group A

Group B

Group C

Group D

Qualification round

(The individual scores and standings of the First stage are accumulated in the Qualification round) If one or more clubs are level on won-lost record, tiebreakers are applied in the following order: #Head-to-head record in matches between the tied clubs #Overall point difference in games between the tied clubs #Overall point difference in all group matches (first tiebreaker if tied clubs are not in the same group) #Points scored in all group matches #Sum of quotients of points scored and points allowed in each group match

Group E

Group F

Group G

Group H

Playoffs

Bracket

Teams in bold advanced to the next round. The numbers to the left of each team indicate the team's seeding, the numbers to the right indicate the result of games including result in bold of the team that won in that game, and the numbers furthest to the right indicate the number of games the team won in that round.

Eight-Final

Quarter-Final

Final four

Semifinals

April 22, Palaeur,

3rd place game

April 24, Palaeur,

Final

April 24, Palaeur,

Final standings

Awards

All official awards of the 1996–97 FIBA EuroLeague.

FIBA EuroLeague Final Four MVP

* David Rivers (

Olympiacos Olympiacós Sýndesmos Filáthlon Peiraiós (, Olympic Association of Fans of Piraeus) is a major multi-sport club based in Piraeus, Greece. Olympiacos is parent to a number of different competitive departments which participate in football, ...

)

FIBA EuroLeague All-Final Four Team

FIBA EuroLeague Top Scorer

* Carlton Myers ( Fortitudo Bologna)

Statistics

Individual statistics

Points

Source
FIBAEurope
/small>

Rebounds

Source

/small>

Assists