2002–03 FIBA Europe Champions Cup
The 2002–03 FIBA Europe Champions Cup was the first edition of Europe's 3rd-tier level transnational competition for men's professional basketball clubs, the FIBA Europe Champions Cup, following the merger of the FIBA Korać Cup and FIBA Saporta Cup competitions into the new ULEB Cup competition. In this first edition of the competition, it was actually the 3rd-tier level on the European club basketball pyramid, featuring 15 domestic league champions. The season consisted of 64 teams. The Greek club Aris Thessaloniki won the title, after beating the Polish club Prokom Trefl Sopot in the Final, which was held at Alexandreio Melathron, in Thessaloniki, Greece.
| 2002–03 FIBA Europe Champions Cup | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Season | 2002–03 | |||||||||
| Finals | ||||||||||
| Champions | Aris (1st title) | |||||||||
| Runners-up | Prokom Trefl Sopot | |||||||||
| Third place | Ventspils | |||||||||
| Fourth place | Hemofarm | |||||||||
| Final Four MVP | Will Solomon | |||||||||
| Statistical leaders | ||||||||||
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The competition, which was initially advertised as FIBA's attempt to revive the FIBA European Champions Cup (now known as the EuroLeague). The competition attracted 15 national domestic league champions, 5 runners-up, and teams from 30 European national leagues, which represented it as a truly pan-European event. Several teams like Split, Aris, PAOK, Lietuvos Rytas, Kalev, Fribourg , Planja, Academic, Levski, APOEL, Ventspils, Rabotnički, and Porto had played for years in FIBA's former Champions Cup (1958–2001).
The brand new competition was also joined by second division runners-up from Italy, Russia and Spain, and the newly promoted champion of the Israeli Second Division. The league was unable to make a good commercial impact, and was then dropped to being the European 4th-tier level in the following 2003–04 season, as FIBA launched the FIBA Europe League to replace it.