The Israel National Team began their EuroBasket exhibition games slate on the right foot after a 76-66 victory over Georgia. After a relatively even first half, the blue-and-white scored at will in the third quarter with Deni Avdija, Yovel Zoosman and Nimrod Levy leading the way. With a 22-point lead heading into the final frame, Georgia pushed to cut down the advantage but ultimately came up short. Israel will play Estonia in Riga on Tuesday at 18:30.

Roman Sorkin opened the game up with points to give Israel an early lead while Khadeen Carrington off the bench and immediately scored in bunches including a number of 3-pointers but Goga Bitadze nailed a pair of triples to keep Georgia in striking distance as Israel stayed in front with a 20-14 lead after ten minutes of play. The Reds opened the second quarter with an 8-2 run to draw even but Sorkin buried a corner 3-ball, however, Toko Shengelia made sure to keep the game within reach with the blue-and-white taking a 29-26 advantage into halftime.

Deni Avdia and Zoosman started off the third quarter with points a plenty while Nimrod Levi and Carrington also scored to give Ariel Beit Halachmi’s squad a 63-42 lead after thity minutes of action. Levi nailed a pair from deep to get the final frame off and running but Georgia began to chip away at the lead with a 9-0 run, but baskets by Tomer Ginat and Sorkin closed out the win.

Sorkin led the way with 18 points, Carrington added 14 points, Zoosman scored 13 points while Avdija and Levy each put in 12 points a piece.

“We can take a lot of good things from this first exhibition game,” Head Coach Ariel Beit Halachmi said. “We divided the minutes between the players on the squad and we learned quite a few things from this game as we need to emphasize offensive rebounding going forward. At the same time, I take a lot of good things for the future.”

Yovel Zoosman also spoke about the game, “We started to see how we are playing together. We need to work on our rebounding but we played better in the second half by moving the ball around and we pressed them. If we do this we will look better and better as the time goes on.”

Nimrod Levi shared his thoughts on the first game, “We feel good and we all want to win, everyone is very motivated. We worked on things we wanted to in the practice game and I’m happy we won. Over time, we will really connect as a team and from practice to practice, we continue to feel better together as a unit. That’s the main thing and we’re looking forward to the Eurobasket.”