Bnei Herzilya downed Maccabi Rishon Le’Zion 92-88 in a back and forth game as Israeli Yair Kravitz’s MVP performance helped the hosts to the win. Dror Cohen’s Rishon squad jumped put too a 49-43 lead at halftime as Anthony Brown and Tu Holloway paced the visitors. But the hosts cut the deficit over the course of the second half thanks to Kravitz along with Chris Babb’s sharpshooting, Chinanu Onuaku find play and Maurice Kemp’s scoring to help Oren Aharoni’s team to the win. Herzliya will now ready to take on Holon in the first State Cup semifinal on Monday.

Kravitz led the way with 21 points, Babb added 15 points and Kemp chipped in with 14 points for Herzliya. Brown paced Rishon with 25 points and Holloway added 20 points in the loss.

“This was a tough game for us after the big State Cup quarterfinal win,” Chris Babb explained. “We never lacked confidence and stayed together as a team. Yair Kravitz has been working hard and improving everyday in practice. I’m very very happy he was able to show it on the floor tonight.”

Hapoel Eilat sunk Nes Ziona 85-68 in a one-sided affair as debutants Noam Avivi (16 points) and Toney Douglas (13 points) starred for Ariel Beit Halachmi’s Red Sea City squad as they notched the blowout win. Eilat grabbed a 40-24 lead after the first half and never looked back to notch the victory.

“We played as we wanted to and we held them to a low score which was our goal,” game MVP Noam Avivi said. “We took advantage of easy baskets and I am happy that things went my way today and that I was able to help the team. I hope that I can continue this way and I believe that we can so some very good things this season.”