What better way to start the new year than with one of the great rivalries in sports between two of the EuroLeague's top three teams?
Barca, Madrid ring in 2024 with El Clásico!
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The second leg of the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague Regular Season opens with another edition of El Clásico as FC Barcelona (11-6) hosts Real Madrid (16-1) on Wednesday.
2023-24: The story so far
Real arrives to the second edition of El Clásico on track for a record-breaking season. Its current 16-1 record is the best start by any team since the new round-robin format began in the 2016-17 season. It has also dominated this rivalry this season, beating Barca in three different official competitions. Barca's last win against Real was in Game 4 of the 2023 Spanish League finals.
In their first meeting this season, Real downed Barca 80-90 in the Spanish SuperCup semifinals and went on to win the title. Dzanan Musa led the winners with 24 points, while Nico Laprovittola had 27 for Barca. On October 1, Real edged Barca 86-79 in Spanish League action behind 22 points and 9 rebounds from Vincent Poirier. In the first clásico of the season on the EuroLeague stage, in Round 5 on October 26, Real prevailed again, 65-64, rallying from a 14-point deficit at home as Gabriel Deck, who has been sidelined lately, starred with 20 points.
Barca: No place like home
Barca comes into this game having recorded just three wins in its last 10 games across all competitions and following a 20-point EuroLeague road loss against AS Monaco. Madrid may have won 33 out of 35 official games this season, but Barca's level rises at home, something to be taken into account. What a better way for Barca to right its ship than with a win at home against its archrivals? Barca is 7-1 at Palau Blaugrana this season in the EuroLeague, losing only to EA7 Emporio Armani Milan, and has the numbers to back up that dominance.
Barca averages 88.1 points at Palau Blaugrana, leading the competition in two-point shooting at home (60.9% 2FG) and ranking fifth in three-point shooting (37.9% 3FG). All three are higher than its road averages: 82.5 points, 56.1% 2FG and 36.9% 3FG, respectively. The most outstanding difference may be this: Barca forward Jabari Parker has made 56.3% of his three-pointers at home and just 22.2% on the road.
What's more, Real has not won a EuroLeague Regular Season game at Palau Blaugrana since February 23, 2018, when it overwhelmed Barca 74-101. After that, however, Los Blancos lost four consecutive regular-season showdowns in Barcelona. Of course, a strong basketball atmosphere is expected to help Barca in this tough game.
Real: On record-breaking pace
It is not just the number of victories, but how Real is getting them, playing fun-to-watch basketball and threatening all-time records. Its average of 21.7 assists is higher than the EuroLeague single-season record of 21.5, which Real holds since the 2014-15 season. As for the accumulated record, Real's 369 assists puts it on track to beat the 861 with which Olympiacos Piraeus set an all-time best last season. On an individual level, Nick Calathes holds the record for most assists in any EuroLeague season, 286 with Panathinaikos Athens in the 2018-19 campaign. Facundo Campazzo of Real has 119 assists and counting.
Real players can boast 23 EuroLeague titles between them, with Rudy Fernandez, Sergio Rodriguez and Sergio Llull won three apiece. All the players on the 17 other EuroLeague teams combine for 36 EuroLeague titles. That speaks volumes about Los Blancos' experience. Earlier this week, Mario Hezonja became the seventh Real player to earn the MVP of the Month award, joining Fernandez, Rodriguez, Llull, Campazzo, Walter Tavares and Guerschon Yabusele, something unprecedented in competition history. If Real finishes this season as strongly as it has started and defense the EuroLeague the trophy, it will mark the club's first back-to-back continental titles since 1967.
Every Clásico matters
One key to succeeding against an archrival in the competition for titles is to prove you can beat them first in mid-season showdowns. Establishing that precedent helps should you meet again with trophies on the line. This is true for every European basketball derby, as all archrivals face each other multiple times.
In the last EuroLeague game between these super-rivals, Barca lost by a point on the road after missing key free throws down the stretch. They were not so far apart then, on Real's floor, as it would seem now. This is why Wednesday's game is extra special for both teams: a win could either take Real closer to a historical season or allow Barca to switch momentum and get a fresh start to 2024 in the best possible way, beating its eternal rival before its home fans.
The stakes are high and the tradition is unmatched. That's why its El Clásico.