Alba Berlin

From Charlottenburg to the top of the league

The club that fills the Uber Arena began as BG Charlottenburg, a basketball club from the western half of the city, founded in 1989. Two years later the recycling company ALBA took on the sponsorship, and in 1991 the club adopted the name it still carries. Its first home was the Sömmeringhalle, a modest hall it used until 1996, before a move to the Max-Schmeling-Halle in Prenzlauer Berg, which served as the club's base from 1996 to 2008.

The breakthrough came early. In the 1994-95 season, with Sasa Obradovic and Teo Alibegovic on the floor and Svetislav Pesic on the bench, Alba won the FIBA Korać Cup, the first European trophy ever lifted by a German club side. That result announced the club domestically as much as abroad. From 1996-97 it won seven German championships in a row, a run that ended after the 2002-03 season and has not been matched since. An eighth title followed in 2007-08, the year the club moved into the newly built arena at Mercedes-Platz in Friedrichshain, then branded O2 World and today the Uber Arena.

The trophy cabinet now holds twelve German championships, eleven German cups and that 1995 Korać Cup. Wikipedia describes Alba as the most successful German basketball team both at home and in Europe, and notes that by membership it became the largest basketball club in the country. Average home crowds of more than 10,000 in a season have put it among the best-supported clubs on the continent.

Twenty years in the EuroLeague, then a deliberate step down

Alba played in the EuroLeague from the 2003-04 season through 2023-24, a stretch of roughly two decades against the richest clubs in European sport. The club rarely had the budget to compete for the trophy, but it built a reputation for producing players rather than buying them. Franz and Moritz Wagner both came through the Alba system before their NCAA and NBA careers, a point the club's coaching staff still makes when explaining its philosophy.

There was also a night that has become club folklore. On 8 October 2014 Alba beat the San Antonio Spurs, then the reigning NBA champions, 94-93 on a buzzer-beater by Jamel McLean in a pre-season exhibition in Berlin.

The 2024-25 season was the low point of the modern era. Alba finished seventh in the Bundesliga, well short of its usual standard, and in March 2025 the club dismissed head coach Israel Gonzalez and appointed Pedro Calles, the Spaniard who had earned the league's Coach of the Year award in 2019 with Rasta Vechta and had since coached the Hamburg Towers and EWE Baskets Oldenburg. Born in Córdoba on 24 August 1983, Calles arrived with a brief to rebuild around younger players.

Then came the decision that defined the next year. After 24 years, the club announced it would leave the EuroLeague and join FIBA's Basketball Champions League for 2025-26, entering the competition on a wild card despite the seventh-place league finish. Calles was open about the reasoning when Eurohoops interviewed him in December 2025: this was a young team in a rebuilding process, and the Champions League offered a more forgiving environment in which to develop prospects rather than chase established stars.

The 2025-26 season: a cup final lost, a title won

The rebuilding team turned out to be rather good. Alba topped its Champions League group with five wins from six, and Eurohoops reported in December 2025 that the club had already set a competition record for the season, with eleven different players scoring ten or more points in a single game. Sam Griesel, Moses Wood, Norris Agbakoko, Bennet Hundt and Justin Bean were among the names carrying the scoring load, and the team led the competition in assists at that point at 24.7 per game.

The domestic cup brought the first disappointment. Alba reached the BBL-Pokal Final Four in Munich on 21 and 22 February 2026, beating Baskets Oldenburg 98-78 in the semi-final before losing the final 74-72 to the Bamberg Baskets in front of 11,500 at the SAP Garden. Bamberg's Demarcus Demonia was named the tournament's most valuable player.

In April 2026 the European run ended at the quarter-final stage against Unicaja Málaga, the defending champions. Alba lost the best-of-three series 2-0, the second game 88-85 after overtime in Málaga. Jack Kayil, aged 20, scored 25 points and forced the extra period with two free throws with one second left in regulation, but Unicaja pulled away in overtime and went on to the Final Four in Badalona.

The league title was won the hard way. Alba finished the regular season second at 24-10, behind Bayern Munich's 29-5, and then needed all five games in each of three play-off series, played from 12 May to 21 June under a new 2-2-1 format. Rasta Vechta won games one and three of the quarter-final before Alba closed it out 96-89 at home on 27 May. Bamberg won games three and four of the semi-final before a 97-66 blowout in Berlin on 9 June settled it. In the final, Bayern took game one 102-94 at home on 12 June; Alba won game two 86-79 in Munich on 14 June; Bayern won game three 91-83 in Berlin on 17 June; Alba won game four 71-61 on 19 June; and on 21 June, in front of 11,500 at the SAP Garden, Alba won the decider 84-81. Justin Bean, a forward who joined in 2023, was named finals MVP. The Berlin legs of the final were played at the old Max-Schmeling-Halle, with 8,899 in attendance at each game, rather than at the Uber Arena.

Where things stand in September 2026

Alba goes into 2026-27 as reigning German champion, still under Calles, and again entered in both the Bundesliga and the Basketball Champions League. FIBA's team profile places the club in Group G of the Champions League regular season, which runs from 6 October 2026 to 16 May 2027.

Pre-season has been compact. The men's team played the Encesta Rías tournament in Pontevedra, Spain, on 9 and 10 September, and on 11 September the club reported a 99-101 defeat to Baskonia Vitoria-Gasteiz, a Spanish EuroLeague side. The same day the club held its season press conference with Dr Axel Schweitzer, Marco Baldi and Svenja Brunckhorst, a week ahead of the opener.

That opener is Friday 18 September 2026 at 8pm at the Uber Arena, against the Niners Chemnitz, and the club has billed the evening as a trophy night to mark the championship. The women's team, which won the German championship in 2024 and the German cup in 2026, plays its home games at the Sömmeringhalle where the men's story began.

A night at the Uber Arena

Home games are played at the Uber Arena, Mercedes-Platz 1 in Friedrichshain, configured for 14,500 for basketball. A game runs to four ten-minute quarters under FIBA rules, with a half-time break and a full evening's worth of arena production around it. The arena sits between Ostbahnhof and Warschauer Strasse, reached by the S3, S5, S7, S75 and S9 S-Bahn lines, the U1 and the M10 and M13 trams, with a footbridge straight from Warschauer Strasse station. Parking in the arena garage costs 12 euros per event.

Since 1 January 2024 the concession stands at Alba home games have been card-only, accepting EC, Visa, Mastercard, Amex, Apple Pay and Google Pay. The club sells individual tickets through its online shop along with bench seats, VIP lounge and premium packages, and organised groups of ten or more can get in from 15 euros a head for the men's games and 7 euros for the women's, according to visitBerlin.

Visitor reviews on Tripadvisor describe the atmosphere at Alba games as electric and the organisation as smooth from the door to the final buzzer, with sightlines good from every level. The consistent complaint is the price of food and drink inside. Uber Arena as a whole holds a 4.5 rating from 348 seat reviews on A View From My Seat, though most of those are for concerts rather than basketball.