The inaugural Euroleague season 2000–01, under the new Euroleague Basketball Company authority, started on October 16, 2000, with a regular season game between hosts Real Madrid and Olympiacos, at the Raimundo Saporta Pavilion in Madrid, Spain, and ended with the championship finals game on May 10, 2001, at the PalaMalaguti arena in Bologna, Italy. This Euroleague season did not feature all the best European teams, as some of them opted to compete in the 2000–01 FIBA SuproLeague competition instead, after the row erupted between the previous Euroleague governing body, FIBA, and the newly established Euroleague Basketball Company.