Artland Dragons, formerly known as QTSV Quakenbrück is a professional basketball club based in Quakenbrück in the collective municipality Artland, in Lower Saxony, Germany. The club's home arena is the Artland Arena, which has a capacity of 3,000 spectators.Website Artland Dragons Between 2003 and 2015 the club played in the Basketball Bundesliga, the top tier of basketball in Germany, and participated in several European competitions. On May 3, 2015, the club announced that it would fold. Ultimately, the management decided to continue operations starting in the third tier, the ProB.Quakenbrücker TSV erhält ProB-Lizenz In 2018, the Dragons were promoted to the second tier, the ProA, where they have played since.

History Basketball has a long tradition in Quakenbrück. It was first played in the Artland-Gymnasium school. The basketball section of the sports club QTSV Quakenbrück was established in 1955. In the 1970s, the first men's team got their first achievement, by being promoted to the second German League, where they stayed for three seasons.

After a long time without great success, Günter 'Ice' Kollmann, former German basketball player and junior national team member, supported the QTSV team as a main sponsor. By continuous work on the youth education in the 1980s, the team had major successes in the 1990s. In 1994, the team was promoted to the second regional league, followed by promotion to the first regional league one season later, and promotion to the second national league another season later. In 2003, the promotion to the highest national league was made and the name of the club changed officially to Artland Dragons from QTSV Quakenbrück. QTSV then became a smaller partner club in a lower regional league.

In the seasons 1995–96 and 2002–03, the team was unbeaten in its league.

Starting from the 2003–04 season, the Artland Dragons played in the first tier BBL a long time. In the 2006–07 season, the team managed to end 2nd in the regular season and played in the BBL Finals. The team lost 3–1 to first seeded Brose Baskets Bamberg. Starting from the 2007–08 season, the team also played in European competitions for 8 straight years.

In May 2015, the club unexpectedly announced that it would dissolve the professional basketball club. The reasons for the closure included that the Dragons could not keep up with the growing budgets of other BBL teams, due to the club's small arena and lack of big sponsors. Keine Chance für Basketball Eventually, the team decided to move back to the third division ProB.

In June 2024, British head coach Vincent Macaulay took over the reins for the Artland Dragons. He started out with a ProA winning streak of 4 games. After going to 4-5 record, he was released. The decision to release Macaulay faced severe criticism as, under new leadership, the Dragons lost 12 games in a row.

Logos

Trophies 2. Basketball Bundesliga North Winners (1): 2003 German Bundesliga Runners-up (1): 2007 German Cup Winners (1): 2008 Runners-up (1): 2007

Season by season SeasonTierLeagueGerman Cup European competitions2000–012 2. BBL - -2001–022 2. BBL - -2002–032 2. BBL - -2003–041 Bundesliga9th - -2004–051 Bundesliga6th - -2005–061 Bundesliga5th Fourth position -2006–071 Bundesliga2ndRunner-up -2007–081 Bundesliga5thChampion 2 ULEB Cup 2008–091 Bundesliga9th - 2 Eurocup 2009–101 Bundesliga9th - 3 EuroChallenge 2010–111 Bundesliga4th Third position 3 EuroChallenge 2011–121 Bundesliga3rd Quarterfinalist 3 EuroChallenge 2012–131 Bundesliga6th Fourth position 2 Eurocup 2013–141 Bundesliga4th Quarterfinalist 2 Eurocup 2014–151 Bundesliga11th - 2 Eurocup 2015–163 ProB6th - -2016–173 ProB - -2017–183 ProB - -2018–192 ProA11th - -2019–202 ProA14th - -2020–212 ProA8th - -2021–222 ProA15th - -2022–232 ProA6th - -2023–242 ProA14th First round -2024–252 ProA17th - -2025–262 ProA7th - -2026–272 ProATBD - -

Players

Current roster

Retired numbers Artland Dragons retired numbers No Player Position Tenure Ceremony date4Thorben DödingPG2015–2025April 19, 202514Brandon ThomasSG/SF/G/FSporting DirectorCoach2011–20122013–20152023–20252025–presentApril 19, 2025

Notable players

Other notable former players Nat. Name current team Thorben Döding UBC Münster Max Rockmann retired Florian Hartenstein retired Yasin Kolo Darius Hall retired Chad Prewitt retired Bryan Bailey retired LaMont McIntosh retired Bryce Taylor retired Brandon Thomas TSV Quakenbrück Chase Griffin retired De’Vondre Perry Macau Giant Pandas

Partner & youth teams The Partner club of the Artland Dragons is the local basketball club "TSV Quakenbrück ("QTSV"), with a men's team playing in the regional league, and a women's team playing in the fifth German women's league. There are also a variety of other teams (youth and adults, also wheelchair basketball). The Male youth teams of the Artland Dragons are the "Young Rasta Dragons" (formerly "Young Dragons"), which plays in the NBBL and the JBBL, the German youth team leagues (Nachwuchs Basketball Bundesliga) and (Jugend Basketball Bundesliga). And the Female team is the Junior Team Osnabrück/Artland (formerly Junior Panthers Osnabrück), which plays in the WNBL the German youth team league (Weibliche Nachwuchs Basketball Bundesliga).

For their Male youth Teams the Artland Dragons work together with the SC Rasta Vechta. And for the Female youth Team the Artland Dragons work together with the GiroLive Panthers Osnabrück and the Osnabrücker SC.

Cheerleader squad and team mascot The cheerleader squad is called "The Flames". It is trained by Steffie Bäker. The team mascot is a dragon called, "Tobi der Drache" (Tobi the Dragon).

References

External links Artland Dragon's website Teamcheck Artland Dragons