2017–18 Baltic Basketball League Explained

The 2017–18 Triobet Baltic Basketball League was the 14th and the last season of the Baltic Basketball League and the third under the title sponsorship of Triobet. The season began on 24 October 2017 and concluded on 5 April 2018. Last year's finalist Pieno žvaigždės defeated Jūrmala in the finals to win their first Baltic Basketball League title.^[1]

Competition format

In this edition 14 teams took part. They were divided into two groups of seven teams where, after a double-legged round-robin, the best four of each group will qualify to the quarterfinals. Kazakh team Barsy Atyrau and Belarusian Tsmoki-Minsk II played all their matches abroad.^[2]

Midway through the season Vytautas withdrew from the league due to them forfeiting two different games in this league for different reasons. As a result, they would participate in a series of friendly matches dubbed the Big Baller Brand Challenge Games; it was created for the purpose of promoting their newest acquisitions at the time in LiAngelo Ball and LaMelo Ball.^[3]

Team information

Group	Team	City, Country	Arena	Head coach
Group A	AVIS Rapla	Rapla, Estonia	Sadolin Sports Hall	Aivar Kuusmaa
	Port of Pärnu	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

Regular season

Group A

Group B

Playoffs

In the knockout phase rounds will be played in a home-and-away format, with the overall cumulative score determining the winner of a round. Thus, the score of one single game can be tied.^[4]

Finals

width=250	Team #1	width=100	Agg.	width=250	Team #2	width=88	1st leg	width=88	2nd leg
	148–174	Pieno žvaigždės	80–98	68–76

Game 1:----

Game 2:

Awards

MVP of the Month

Month	Player	Team	Ref.
November 2017			[5]
December 2017			[6]
January 2018			[7]
February 2018			[8]
March 2018	Laurynas Birutis (2)		[9] Finals MVP Jahenns Manigat ( Pieno žvaigždės)[10] Player statistics Players qualify to this category by having at least 50% games played. Points class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align: center;" Rank width=200 Name width=210 Team Games width=75 Points width=40 PPG 1 Yauheni Beliankou Tsmoki-Minsk II 10 184 18.40 2 Jānis Kaufmanis Valmiera ORDO 12 196 16.33 3 Nolan Cressler AVIS Utilitas Rapla 12 194 16.17 Assists Rank width=210 Name width=200 Team Games width=75 Assists width=40 APG 1 Donatas Sabeckis Šiauliai 16 110 6.88 2 Norman Käbin TTÜ 12 69 5.75 3 Rinalds Sirsniņš Ogre Kumho Tyre 14 75 5.36 Rebounds Rank width=200 Name width=210 Team Games width=75 Rebounds width=40 RPG 1 Viktors Iļjins Valmiera ORDO 11 121 11.00 2 Bamba Fall TLÜ Kalev 14 119 8.50 3 Devonte Upson AVIS Utilitas Rapla 12 97 8.08 Efficiency Rank width=200 Name width=210 Team Games width=75 Efficiency width=40 PIR 1 Laurynas Birutis Šiauliai 15 302 20.13 2 Bamba Fall TLÜ Kalev 14 280 20.00 3 Viktors Iļjins Valmiera ORDO 11 209 19.00 External links Official website

Notes and References

1. Web site: NPieno Zvaigzdes crowned as BBL champions. Baltic Basketball League. 5 April 2018. 6 April 2018.
2. Web site: New BBL season ready for tip-off . Baltic Basketball League. 12 October 2017. 17 October 2017.
3. Web site: Prienu Vytautas to Play in 'Big Baller Brand Challenge Games'. Sports Illustrated. 6 January 2018. 6 January 2018.
4. Web site: Competition system. Baltic Basketball League. 7 February 2018.
5. Web site: Steven Cook lands first Player of the Month award. Baltic Basketball League. 1 December 2017. 7 February 2018.
6. Web site: Birutis claims player of the month honors. Baltic Basketball League. 29 December 2017. 7 February 2018.
7. Web site: Janar Talts claims January's Player of the Month honors. Baltic Basketball League. 2 February 2018. 7 February 2018.
8. Web site: Ivars Zvigurs lights up February for Player of the Month award. Baltic Basketball League. 1 March 2018. 7 March 2018.
9. Web site: Birutis rakes in March MVP honors. Baltic Basketball League. 1 April 2018. 2 April 2018.
10. Web site: Finals MVP Manigat: "You're only as good as your fans". Baltic Basketball League. 6 April 2018. 12 April 2018.