Maccabi Tel Aviv defeated Hapoel Gilboa Galil 80-73 as Tamir Blatt carried the team early from deep while Jaylen Hoard dunked and scored at will on the inside late to help the yellow-and-blue to the win.

Head Coach Oded Katash’s team arrived roughly 45 minutes prior to tip off due to the Passover Holiday traffic but that didn’t hurt Tamir Blatt from getting off to a hot start from deep but newcomer Josh Price along with Elijah Childs scored to give Sharon Avrahami’s team a 38-36 advantage at halftime. Jaylen Hoard and Roman Sorkin started to make an impact in the second half as Maccabi pulled away to take the victory.

Hoard scored 19 points, Blatt added 15 points and Sorkin scored 12 points in the win. Josh Price and Paul Scruggs each scored 15 points while Childs put in 14 points in the loss.

“This wasn’t an easy game and we knew that it wouldn’t be,” Katash said. “They are a good team especially at home and we haven’t played well in the league recently. We had a very poor second quarter and went into halftime down, but we showed character and we played defense as well.”

“We didn’t start the game well and weren’t aggressive enough,” Avrahami said. “But we did do that in the second half. However, we didn’t shoot well from deep 3/21 and if we don’t hit our shots that is going to hurt us. We were able to keep it close but we needed a bit more in odder to come out on top.”

The game MVP Jaylen Hoard shared his those on the win, “It was a hard fought game and we knew they would play aggressive and we had to match their energy and we responded well in the second half which helped us get the win. Now we have two more important wins to go.”

Elijah Childs spoke about the game from his point of view, “It was a very good first half from us, we were aggressive ans we had great energy but they capitalized off the mistakes and we got off out of our game plan a bit. Howver, when we play like this we can compete against anybody.”

Tamir Blatt drained a pair from deep and Jaylen Hoard added a couple of baskets for Maccabi Tel Aviv, Elijah Childs, Ish El-Amin and Paul Scruggs all scored for Hapoel Gilboa Galil but points from Rafi Menco, Trevion Williams and Jimmy Clark gave the yellow-and-blue a 28-21 lead after ten minutes of play. Gilboa newcomer Josh Price scored a trio of buckets in the paint, Gur Lavy also found points, Price kept scoring at will, Levi Randolph countered, but free throws from Paul Scruggs gave Sharon Avrahami’s team a 38-36 advantage at halftime.

Blatt went from deep, Hoard addd a 3-point play and Roman Sorkin dialled up long distance to begin the third quarter, Lavy and Scruggs responded, Menco knocked down a corner 3-ball and Williams added points inside to take a 61-54 lead after thirty minutes of action. Jokubaitis began the fourth quarter with a deuce, Lavy and Hoard traded baskets, Sorkin went from deep and then from the inside, El-Amin scored from the outside and inside, Scruggs dialled up long distance but Hoard put down a pair of dunks to wrap up the Maccabi win.