Baloncesto Fuenlabrada, S.A.D., also known as Montakit Fuenlabrada by sponsorship reasons, is a professional basketball team based in Fuenlabrada, Spain. The team plays in the Liga ACB and plays their home games at Fernando Martín.
History
Founded in 1983, Fuenlabrada started to compete at a local level. The club joined national competitions two years later and worked its way up, reaching the first regional division in the late 1980s. By 1991, it already became Baloncesto Fuenlabrada and a year later, it merged with CB Torrejón de Ardoz to compete in the Spanish second division. Fuenlabrada acquired Club Peñas Recreativas de Huesca's rights to earn the right to compete in the Spanish first division in the 1996–97 season. The club went down to the second division, but inked scoring machine Velimir Perasović and returned to the elite level a year later. With Perasović, Carlos Cazorla, Ferran Lopez and Salvador Guardia as its main pillars, the addition of Nate Huffman allowed Fuenlabrada to make it to the Spanish League playoffsin 1999 and their debut in the Korać Cup. Perasović kept filling the baskets for several seasons, leading Fuenlabrada to two more playoffs appearances in 2001 and 2002, helped by David Wood, Chuck Kornegay and a young José Manuel Calderón and coached by Óscar Quintana. Fuenlabrada made its ULEB Cup debut in the 2002–03 season, in which Herrmann was chosen as the Spanish League MVP. The club returned to the Spanish second division in 2004 but came back, for good, a year later. Players like Saúl Blanco, Jorge García, Kristaps Valters and Brad Oleson kept Fuenlabrada in the first division for years without much trouble. The club returned to the Spanish League playoffs in the 2010–11 season with Salva Maldonado as head coach and a young Gustavo Ayón as its star center. One year later, the club would be eliminated in the quarterfinals of the EuroChallenge by Triumph Lyubertsy. Despite this European achievement, Fuenlabrada would continue fighting to avoid relegation, finally being relegated to LEB Oro in 2015. However, the club continued in Liga ACB as Ford Burgos and Club Ourense Baloncesto would not fulfill the requirements for promoting. Fuenlabrada took advantage and led by Marko Popović, Jonathan Tabu and Ivan Paunić, Fuenlabrada made it to the Spanish League playoffs, earning the right to return to the EuroCup 13 years later. In the 2016-2017 season, Fuenlabrada played well and qualified to the EuroCup Top16. However, they only finished 12th in the ACB. After a 9th place finish in the 2017-2018 ACB season, Fuenlabrada earned the right to compete in the FIBA Basketball Champions League. Fuenlabrada won the first 3 games, before suffering a complete fiasco and finishing the tournament with 11 consecutive losses.
Sponsorship naming
Baloncesto Fuenlabrada has had several denominations through the years due to its sponsorship:
Baloncesto Fuenlabrada B, also known as Fundación Baloncesto Fuenlabrada, is the reserve team of Fuenlabrada. Originally created in 1995, it was re-opened in 2013 by achieving a vacant berth in LEB Plata. In its first season after the re-opening, Fundación Baloncesto Fuenlabrada finished as champion of the 2013–14 LEB Plata and runner-up of the Copa LEB Plata. Despite promoting to LEB Oro, the club decided to continue playing in the same league of the previous season, but in Getafe as a result of a collaboration agreement with the town and CB Getafe, the main club in that city.
