2004–05 Euroleague

The 2004–05 Euroleague was the fifth season of the professional basketball competition for elite clubs throughout Europe, organised by Euroleague Basketball Company, and it was the 48th season of the premier competition for European men's clubs overall. The 2004–05 season featured 24 competing teams, from 13 countries. The final of the competition was held in Olimpiisky Arena, Moscow, Russia, with the defending champions, Maccabi Tel Aviv, defeating Tau Cerámica by a score of 90-78.

Team allocation

Distribution

The table below shows the default access list.

Teams

The labels in the parentheses show how each team qualified for the place of its starting round (TH: EuroLeague title holders)

1st, 2nd, etc.: League position after Playoffs
WC: Wild card

Regular season

The first phase was a regular season, in which the competing teams were drawn into three groups, each containing eight teams. Each team played every other team in its group at home and away, resulting in 14 games for each team in the first stage. The top 5 teams in each group and the best sixth-placed team advanced to the next round. The complete list of tiebreakers was provided in the lead-in to the Regular Season results.

If one or more clubs were level on won-lost record, tiebreakers were 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 were 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 C

Top 16

The surviving teams were divided into four groups of four teams each, and again a round robin system was adopted, resulting in 6 games each, with the two top teams advancing to the quarterfinals. Tiebreakers were identical to those used in the Regular Season.

The draw was held in accordance with Euroleague rules.

The teams were placed into four pools, as follows:

Level 1: The three group winners, plus the top-ranked second-place team

CSKA Moscow, Climamio Bologna, Maccabi Elite Tel Aviv, Efes Pilsen

Level 2: The remaining second-place teams, plus the top two third-place teams

FC Barcelona, Panathinaikos, Benetton Treviso, Cibona

Level 3: The remaining third-place team, plus the three fourth-place teams

Žalgiris, Ülker, Real Madrid, AEK

Level 4: The fifth-place teams, plus the top ranked sixth-place team

Tau Cerámica, Montepaschi Siena, Prokom Trefl Sopot, Scavolini Pesaro

Each Top 16 group included one team from each pool. The draw was conducted under the following restrictions:

No more than two teams from the same Regular Season group could be placed in the same Top 16 group.
No more than two teams from the same country could be placed in the same Top 16 group.
If there was a conflict between these two restrictions, (1) would receive priority.

Quarterfinals

Each quarterfinal was a best-of-three series between a first-place team in the Top 16 and a second-place team from a different group, with the first-place team receiving home advantage.