Basketball Champions League opening day: Bonn survives Porto scare, Hernangomez headlines a dominant Unicaja night

Bonn survived. Barely. The final was 78-74 over FC Porto, and if you're looking for the closest game of the night across all six Round 1 matchups in the Basketball Champions League, congratulations, you found it. Alijah Comithier did the heavy lifting for Bonn — 18 points on 3-of-5 shooting from 3-points (the kind of efficiency that makes you wonder why he only took five), 2-of-6 on 2s, 5 boards, an 18 PIR. Not a masterpiece, but enough.

Bonn hangs on through a tense finish

Bonn came out hot, 25-16 after one, the kind of start that makes you think the home team is about to cruise. It did not cruise. Porto matched Bonn quarter for quarter after that — 16-16, then 16-16 again — without cutting into the nine-point gap.

Then the fourth quarter happened: Porto dropped 26 points, the biggest quarter total either team managed all night, and suddenly Bonn's comfortable cushion looked a lot less comfortable. They held on by four. That's the whole story.

Antwerp holds on, ALBA pulls away

Windrose Giants Antwerp beat FALCO-VULCANO Szombathely 99-93 — six points, closer than the box score probably felt in the moment. Enoch Cheeks was cooking from deep, 4-of-8 from 3-points on his way to 23 points, two steals, two blocks, a 26 PIR. But Zoltan Perl wasn't exactly a bystander on the other end — 25 points, 5 boards, 3 assists, a 31 PIR that tied for the second-best number of the entire night.

Antwerp opened the game with a 34-point first quarter (its best stretch of the night, for what that's worth) and built an 11-point lead at 34-23. Szombathely answered with a 26-point third to make things interesting again, and Antwerp had to grind the rest of the way to close it out.

ALBA Berlin, meanwhile, had no such drama. They went into Slavia Praha and left with a 110-86 win, a 24-point beatdown that was never really in question. Brandon Angel was efficient and then some — 2-of-2 from deep, 21 points, 7 rebounds, 3 assists, a 31 PIR matching Perl's. ALBA led wire to wire, every quarter, and the knockout blow came in the third: 34 points, the best period either team produced all game. The third quarter turned a lead into a rout.

Trabzonspor shakes off a slow start to beat Nanterre

Trabzonspor won this one, 93-83, and Marcus Keene was the engine — 24 points, 6 assists, 4-of-6 from 3-points, a 26 PIR. But Nanterre actually looked like the better team early on. They led 19-18 after the first quarter, which, if you'd stopped watching right there, would've told you a very different story than the one that unfolded.

Trabzonspor flipped it in the second, outscoring Nanterre 27 to not-enough and taking a 45-41 lead into halftime. The home team kept its foot down in the third — 19-13 — and while Nanterre put together a strong fourth quarter, it was too little, too late.

Hernangomez tops every player on the night as Unicaja routs Utenos

And then there's Unicaja, which didn't just win — it made a statement. The final was 105-69 over Utenos Juventus, a 36-point gap that stands as the widest margin of the night by a comfortable distance. The headline, though, is Willy Hernangomez, who turned in the single best individual line anyone posted all evening: 8-of-8 on 2-pointers, 7-of-8 from the free-throw line, 23 points, 9 rebounds, 4 assists — and he didn't even bother with a shot from 3-points.

In just 20 minutes and 27 seconds, mind you. His PIR landed at 39, well clear of the 31 that Perl and Angel each managed. Unicaja set the tone from the jump, 20-8 in the first for a 12-point cushion, then salted it away with a 34-point third quarter — its best of the night — that put the outcome out of reach long before the fourth even started.

UCAM Murcia closed out the slate with its own statement, an 85-58 win over Itelyum Varese, 27 points on the margin. Dylan Ennis ran the show — 16 points, 5 assists, 2 blocks, a 20 PIR. Murcia led by 8 after the first quarter and just kept piling on, a 27-point third quarter breaking the game open before coasting home in the fourth.

Six games, one true nail-biter in Bonn, and one player — Hernangomez — who made the rest of the league look slow by comparison. A 36-point margin and a 39 PIR line aren't just numbers to file away; they're the bar everyone else in this Round 1 field now has to clear.