AEK Athens Eliminates Malaga and Killian Tillie in Semifinals: There Will Be No Spanish Team in the Final!
BCL – AEK Athens joins BC Rytas Vilnius in the 2026 BCL final after beating Malaga 78-65! Like Tenerife, the Spanish team was largely dominated in this Final Four in Badalona. Trailing from start to finish, the team of French international Killian Tillie will play for third place on Saturday.
Photo Credit : FIBA
In Badalona,
Like the Lithuanian supporters of Rytas Vilnius, the Greek fans of AEK Athens took over in the stands from before the match. And their favorite team followed them on the pitch. Athlitikí Énosis Konstantinoupóleos – meaning « The Athletic Union of Constantinople » – a 102-year-old sporting institution whose origins lie with Greek refugees from Constantinople (now Istanbul) forced into exile after the Greco-Turkish War, dominated head and shoulders the defending double-champions, winners in 2025 in… Athens.
It’s quite simple: after 10 minutes, the legendary Dragan Sakota’s team had left their opponents with just 9 points. At halftime, they were limited to 21 points (compared to 37 scored), the smallest offensive first half in BCL history. And although the Andalusians suggested a possible comeback in the third quarter, Frank Bartley (1.91m, 32 years old), Lukas Lekavicius (1.80m, 32 years old), James Nunnally (2.01m, 35 years old) and company always had an answer for them.
« We couldn’t get any shots to fall »
Killian Tillie, French international playing at Malaga
« From the start of the match, we couldn’t get any shots to fall, » commented the only French player present at this Final Four, Killian Tillie (2.08m, 28 years old), who had 7 points and 4 rebounds in 11 minutes in his return to competition (injured, he hadn’t played since April 19). We weren’t running. Usually, we run all the time. We were decent on defense, but we couldn’t get any shots to fall. In the second half, we start very well. We think we’re going to pull away and they hit a few big three-pointers. It’s frustrating. We stayed behind the whole game. We tried to get back into it, it didn’t work. »
Kendrick Perry (Unicaja) - Frank Bartley (AEK Betsson BC)Kendrick Perry Frank Bartley PTS 12 16 REB 0 2 AST 6 2 STL 1 1 BLK 0 0
In the end, AEK Athens won 78-65 without any real trouble against a Malaga team that was never able to recover to the level of these past three seasons, as evidenced by their record in Liga Endesa, which is more mixed (16 wins and 13 losses). Third at home last year after eliminating Nanterre in the quarterfinals, the Greeks are back in the championship match, six years later. A chance to snatch their second BCL, after the 2018 trophy.
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