Will it be bored? “I hope,” says Johannes Voigtmann. The basketball players of FC Bayern Munich are certainly not: “It could be a tricky tournament”, predicted captain Vladimir Lucic. This tournament takes place in a small multi-purpose hall at the weekend, which almost needed a big favorite to underestimate the home team: On Saturday at 4 p.m. the “Top Four” starts in the DBB Cup with the host Central German Basketball Club (MBC) FC Bayern. Apparently, many fans believe in boredom: 3000 spectators fit into the Weißenfels town hall, the smallest in league operations, but on Friday there were still tickets for the national cup final.
The venue was the dominant topic for a long time. Last year, Bayern defended the title in their own hall, from next year there will be a fixed venue in Düsseldorf. Ultimately, Weißenfels had been awarded the contract because an MBC sponsor wanted to raise the necessary money and to secure the rights of name. The association requires a kind of host fee of 150,000 euros. And now: (yet) not sold out. There are so many world champions. Hadn’t it even said that the German national team’s World Cup victory would trigger a boom in the country 17 months ago?
It is 395 kilometers from the Munich BMW Park to the city hall in Saxony-Anhalt, and even if it is only 391 kilometers from the SAP Garden, Bayern have recently continued to compete with German competition. They now regularly play in the Euroleague in front of well more than 10,000 spectators, the team ripens slowly but steadily into a European top team. It always said that FC Bayern’s entry would improve the league. Overall, this is certainly the case. But because Alba Berlin is currently weakening, there is no opponent within reach of the Munich. The venue of the final tournament becomes a current symbol of the prevailing gradient: rich against not so rich, a little good also city against country, west against east. “Bavaria will underestimate us,” claims the massive MBC center John Bryant.
First the MBC plays against defending champion Bayern, in the second semi -finals Frankfurt and Bamberg face each other
But the Munichers won’t do that. Voigtmann, for example, is not the guy at all, he prefers to grind something, he prefers to grind himself. The 32-year-old from Eisenach is also highly motivated because he with his former teams like Olimpia Milan, but never a trophy won. Most recently in the league, Bayern beat the Skyliners Frankfurt 70:56 at the end. And Frankfurt is also a possible final opponent on Sunday: The Hessen meet on Saturday evening (7 p.m.) on the Bamberg Baskets. Voigtmann had received a break in the league on Tuesday evening “to compensate for the stresses of the past few weeks,” as he says. So it can be assumed that he should play a central role at the weekend.
However, Bayern also have their problems. A week and a half they had time to realign their structure since Center Devin Booker was injured on the knee. And Captain Lucic also openly admits that the energy level cannot always be at the top in view of the game plan. Bayern have already played 14 games in 2025. “You just have to find a way through it,” he says, so: bite through. Lucic was injured for months, whose value for the team was “not to be put into words,” enthuses Voigtmann.
The biggest problem in Bavaria is the stress, but no team has so much quality in the squad
On the one hand, the Bavarians are very popular, they are currently putting the oldest team in the Bundesliga on average. On the other hand, you are in a permanent change, which can always lead to slipping. Rasta Vechta caught Bayern twice at the right time, and with a view to Saturday it is particularly explosive that the defending champion lost in the league in the league with 75:79 in Weißenfels. “It took us a long time and are still on the way that we can get the defense really stable,” explains Voigtmann. This is necessary to be among the best. And now the season phase begins, in which it depends on how far the upheaval has already been completed.
World champion Voigtmann moved together with the world champion coach Gordon Herbert to Munich, of course, to win titles. Precisely because of the enormous role of favorites is at stake for the experienced Herbert. “Weißenfels is a good team,” says the Canadian, he even thinks that the opponent is now better than the Bayern defeat in October. However, it is also possible that this defeat sharpens the senses a little for the cozy town hall. Herbert, who has changed from the national coach to the team coach with a full schedule in the past few months, speaks a lot of “a dusk”, and sometimes, on Euroleague evenings with press conferences shortly before midnight, he is also to look at.
Nevertheless, even in the toughest phases, he does without the use of some players who obviously couldn’t get his trust. While he answered questions next to the field on Thursday after training, most players were already in the cabin. Only Onuralp Bitim and Kevin Yebo threw a few baskets, it almost seemed like after seating. Against Frankfurt both did not play a second recently – and probably not to protect them for the cup tournament. “I am confident that everyone will ride apart from Devin,” said Gordon Herbert. Some of his regular players would have to underestimate the opponent so that everyone is really used.
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