Maccabi Tel Aviv maintained a perfect balance in the Premier League after five rounds when it beat Hapoel Tel Aviv 90:95 last night (Sunday) in a derby at the end of a close and volatile game.
The Yellows avoided a streak of losses and will try to continue the trend change when they host Olympiakos tomorrow (21:05) at the start of the double week in the Euroleague.
Maccabi started the game well, leading by 13 in the second quarter, but then stopped playing and saw how the Reds took control of the game and took the lead in the third quarter.
At this stage, Oded Ketesh introduced John DiBartolomeu who scored 15 of his 18 points in the second half and was the main person responsible for the big change made by the yellows.
"I have experience, I'm working on how to express it. I'm happy that in the second half we were able to generate momentum and win the game. The plus/minus? It doesn't mean much," DiBartolomeu said about his feelings and the fact that in his minutes on the field, the Yellows won in -25 difference.
"Obviously, these games are special for us, the longer you're here, the more you understand it. We have a lot of new players this year, and it's different when you've been here a long time. Anyway, we have a lot of players, and every time we need someone to step up. I'm happy that I was able to help. These derbies are important to me, especially after we had difficulties with them last season."
Another player who was at his best was Roman Sorkin who recorded a career high of 13 rebounds along with 14 points.
The center of the Yellows said at the end: "I tried to play the game, Oded asks us to go for the offensive rebound, in the last game I didn't do it and he warned me. I'm happy that I set a record, it's important that we won, we have a lot of games and every game is important. Every derby doesn't matter If it's the fifth game of the season and a normal league game, it has its own rules. Every derby is important for the club, for everyone in the team. I don't think we came here afraid, we came to win the game, to play good basketball. We lost our last game, and we wanted to turn momentum We want to win every game."
understands the importance.
DiBartholomew (Photo: Danny Maron)
Two things worried the Maccabi men at the end of the game.
The first is the defensive ability, after another game the team again scores more than 90 points, and at no stage of the game was it able to generate significant defensive momentum.
"If we keep like this we don't have much of a chance against Olympiakos", the team admitted during the night, "we will have to show completely different things".
The second thing is Lorenzo Brown's ability.
After a bad game against Partizan Belgrade, came the second bad game of the coordinator against Hapoel Tel Aviv, with 4 points and 8 assists in 27 minutes.
Despite the poor ability, Oded Ketch gave the Browns a lot of credit last night.
"I trust Lorenzo Brown a lot. Top players win games and sometimes lose games," Ketch said of his star, "When I talked about this schedule of games, about going from one game to another, I knew it's not easy for basketball players. He's not the only one who has ups and downs During the season. I trust him, he is our leader, one of our two or three leaders. In the end, we will reach this year where Lorenzo will take us, with two or three other players. He came here to be dominant, it does not disappoint me."
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basketball
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Maccabi Tel Aviv in basketball