Burn the paper. Without Othello Hunter, and with Ante Žižić still struggling to get out of the bad period, it seemed that at least on paper, Hapoel Jerusalem could have a certain advantage on the front line, certainly on offense, certainly on picnrol which is considered Oded Katash’s expertise, certainly when we saw Žižić has such a hard time in front of portable tallies from him. So Maccabi Tel Aviv took the paper, and just crumpled it up and threw it in the trash, proving that at least as of last night, the level gaps between it and its sworn rival from the capital are still too big.
After a difficult month, Zizic finally managed to show why Maccabi fought him. 21 points on 69% of the field, 10 rebounds, of which no less than 7 on offense, 26 index points, a lot of color mobility, and especially presence in the defense and reading of the pick-and-roll situations of Jerusalem. In the first half he hardly let Tyson Thomas or Suleiman Braimo roll into the paint, which disrupted the red attack and forced the visitors to take hard shots.
And indeed, the coach Yannis Sapropoulos Believes that in the Euroleague his front line also showed good ability: “Hunter had a decline and he came back, he has great strength inside, Bender has played a different form in the last month, also Caspi – we have domestic players. We advanced in the Euroleague in the domestic game, and played better. “Izic gave a good game against Zenit, so I think this improvement is noticeable not only in the Israeli league but also in the Euroleague.”
Does not stop in red. When Scotty Wilbkin sees Hapoel Jerusalem – he lights up. In eight games, Wilbkin has played against Jerusalem in the regular season for the past three seasons, and note his output in them: 22.3 points and 54.1% imaginary outside the arc. Last night he only needed one three to equal nine other players who hold the record for threes per game, which stands at 9 threes, and it seemed that if only he wanted to, Wilbkin would have been able to smash that record to pieces as well.
However, despite the wonderful ability, Wilbkin Sounds pretty indifferent at the end: “Like in every game, I did my best and what the team needed from me, and that was to score. We played well with 40 full minutes on defense and offense. On Sunday we have another cup game, and of course we will try to win it too.”
And now for the derby. Since winning the Winner’s Cup, Sapropoulos has been trying to instill in his players a mentality of forgetting about the just-concluded game, regardless of the outcome. This is also what he tried to broadcast last night at the end: “You have to enjoy the win, but there is a sequel, and you have to be ready for the next game. It’s not a statement, the season is long, we have a lot of games to play and a lot of frames. Sometimes it depends “We played a good game and that’s it. We don’t want to analyze too much, we want to move on.”
Oz laser He admitted that there is a feeling that for big games Maccabi is stabilizing in full exclusion, which is not the case in “smaller” games. “We feel it happens sometimes, even though we don’t want it to happen,” he said. “During a season there are ups and downs, especially when playing at a crazy pace. Sometimes there is a drop in energy and it doesn’t have to be. You have to work on it because every team has to come in super “Concentration and super aggression like today. We lacked against Zenit.”
Finally, Blazer sent reinforcements to Tamir Blatt who injured his knee and was taken off the field with the help of his teammates: “It’s always hard to see an injured player, especially an Israeli who is a friend. “We wish him well and that he will recover as soon as possible.”
