Basketball

Basketball at FC Bayern has a long and proud history. As German champions in 1954 and 1955 and cup winners in 1968, the team ranked as one of the nation’s finest in a previous era. That was followed by a lengthy spell away from the top echelons, but a resurgent FCBB are now firmly established as a Bundesliga power again. The highlight of the renaissance to date was the 2014 German championship triumph under head coach Svetislav Pesic. And FC Bayern are also back among the elite in the Euroleague, the Champions League of basketball. The debutants from Munich made it to the Top16 round in their first shot at the competition in 2013/2014.

The full basketball experience in the Audi Dome

With an average home crowd of more than 6,000 creating a frenzied atmosphere in the Audi Dome, FCBB have thus completed a rapid ascent to the top of the domestic game. It was as recently as spring 2010 when a referendum of club members yielded a significant majority in favour of the project launched by Uli Hoeneß and then vice-president Bernd Rauch: to make basketball the club’s number two professional sport after football.

Since then, especially at their home Audi Dome, watching the team has become a memorable live experience with roller-coaster emotions and thrilling games. And results have been excellent too: just a year after the membership gave the project the green light, the team were promoted to the top tier and rapidly ascended up the league hierarchy. FCBB were play-off quarter-finalists in the first year, semi-finalists in the second, and triumphant winners of a thrilling final series against previous serial champions Berlin on 18 June 2014. It meant FC Bayern were German basketball champions for the first time in 59 years. “All of us on the executive committee are incredibly proud of our team,” said club president Karl Hopfner a few weeks later at a Town Hall reception hosted by Mayor of Munich Dieter Reiter.

Targeted youth development

FC Bayern München field a number of other teams apart form the BBL professionals. A major priority is the club’s structured youth programme, providing targeted support for younger players. The teams are all performance and competition-oriented and feature in the highest available leagues for their age groups: the U-19 in the NBBL junior Bundesliga, the U-16 in the JBBL youth Bundesliga, and the U-14 in the Bayernliga state league. The objective is to develop performance-oriented youths as personalities and athletes, although an individual player’s personal development always takes priority over short-term team success and trophies.

FC Bayern Basketball as a commercial operating business was spun off from the FC Bayern München eV members’ club on 1 October 2014 and constituted as a limited company (GmbH). The sole shareholder in FC Bayern München Basketball GmbH is FC Bayern München eV.

For more information on the FC Bayern Munich basketball section visit: www.fcb-basketball.de.

 

Key facts