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sep 06 2026The white team took advantage of their rival's absences to build a commanding lead early. Facundo Campazzo, with 22 points, was the game's leading scorer.
Real Madrid began fine-tuning their machinery for the new EuroLeague SuperCup they will play in a few weeks in Abu Dhabi, taking advantage of the emotional I Urbano González Memorial to find the necessary chemistry with their revamped roster.
However, the opponent they faced, Kosner Baskonia, which had already been forced to suspend a previous warm-up game due to lack of available players, was not the best barometer to measure their potential, as evidenced by the lopsided final score.
In León, there has been hunger for years for elite basketball, the kind they experienced until their last relegation in May 2008 and the subsequent disappearance of Baloncesto León, heir to an Elosúa that in the 90s made all the great teams that passed through their municipal palace bite the dust, both from the ACB League and also historic European sides like Milan and Rome.
After the synergy of bringing different clubs together under the umbrella of football and Cultural y Deportiva Leonesa with the backing of Qatar's Aspire Academy, fans now dream from Segunda FEB of reliving the historic afternoons and evenings they long for, as well as a cup final phase that in 97 left in memory an unforgettable quarterfinal matchup between the two giants, Real Madrid and FC Barcelona.
That is why it is not surprising the gala atmosphere with packed stands on such an emotional day as the I Memorial that remembered the figure of one of Elosúa's "warriors", the late point guard-shooting guard Urbano González, who now gives his name to the municipal palace that honors the memory of a fighter for the rights of ALS patients, which he carried with the utmost composure until his death last January.
Family, friends and basketball lovers wanted to fulfill one of his dreams: to bring together the cream of Spanish basketball at a preseason event to become, over time, one of the essential dates in preparation, with the added benefit of its charitable nature because all proceeds will go entirely to FUNDELA - Spanish Foundation for ALS Research.
The game was more than an appetizing excuse to see the new Real Madrid of Pedro Martínez and the debut of his new additions, the former Baskonia player Luwawu-Cabarrot, Finnish Jantunen, the Jones-Sarr frontcourt pair, one of the trusted players of new coach Jaime Pradilla, or the Ukrainian forward trained in the León School academy and with NBA pedigree with the Boston Celtics.
The superiority of the whites, with practically their entire arsenal against a very depleted Baskonia, was far removed from the Copa del Rey final matchup in Valencia where the Vitoria team surprised the team then coached by Sergio Scariolo.
With their machinery and wrists fully warmed up, Real Madrid quickly shifted into high gear to score an astounding 46 points in the first quarter and only occasionally lower the intensity to reach halftime leading 78-39 against a rival where their new additions for this season—Duarte, Simmons, Fritch and Lawson—could do little against such a difference in every aspect and could only note details.
After the halftime break, little changed because, although the whites also did not want to inflict too much damage, before closing the third quarter they had already surpassed the century mark with a three-pointer precisely from the "local" Shulga.
The final ten minutes served for individual highlights, also on the Vitoria side, wounded in their pride and attempting to minimally improve the scoreboard with good minutes from Mateo Spagnolo to win the final quarter, with Real Madrid's Argentine point guard Facundo Campazzo as the game's MVP.
121-Real Madrid (46+32+28+15): Campazzo (22), Shulga (14), Abalde (11), Okeke (5), Sarr (11); Luwawu-Cabarrot (15), Jantunen (6), Feliz (13), Maledon (14), Pradilla (2), Jones (4), Llull (4).
80- Kosner Baskonia (26+13+20+21): Lawson (13), Simmons (7), Duarte (8), Frisch (5), Alves (3); Baugh (6), N'Guessan (12), Spagnolo (19), Souza (-), Ngounoma (7), Alonso (-).
